


Only Hate The Road When You're Missing Home

by sunsetmog



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Famous Liam, M/M, Marriage, Non-Famous Louis, Second Chances, Secret Relationship, Secrets, Separation, boys making poor life choices
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-17
Updated: 2015-04-17
Packaged: 2018-03-23 10:53:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 49,126
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3765451
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunsetmog/pseuds/sunsetmog
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Louis hadn't seen Liam in three years and seven months. Not that he was counting; it was just that some facts seemed indelibly burnt into his brain, and no amount of trying could make them go away. </p><p>An AU of sorts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Only Hate The Road When You're Missing Home

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to **oliviacirce** and **hermette** for the betas. I love you both.  <3
> 
> I have been working on this story on and off for over two years, in between other stories. Thank you to everyone who read it along the way, and to those of you who read this when I was posting bits of it to my Tumblr. 
> 
> I rather suspect I started writing this for **harriet_vane**. I got to finish it sitting next to her on a train, which is exactly how I would have chosen to end it. 
> 
> Title from Passenger's Let Her Go.

The rumour spread like wildfire round the club. Even Louis—who had finished his second-to-last-ever teaching placement about six hours earlier, and had spent the time between then and now making positive life choices in the form of increasingly neon shots of whatever alcohol he could get his hands on—heard it, and Louis had been having problems making vowel sounds for the last ninety minutes. 

"Oh my fucking god," Niall said, clapping Louis on the back and almost making him spill his unidentifiable drink. Louis had stopped paying attention to what exactly was in his glass once he'd realised he could just point randomly at the all night happy hour menu, and the barman would subsequently provide him with something brim-full of alcohol, potentially brilliant, and that might possibly correspond with the general area Louis was pointing at on the menu. "I'm going to go and say hi. I am, I really am. Tell him I think he's amazing."

Niall was the most unapologetic cheesy music fan that Louis knew. Normally Louis made fun of him for it, because nobody who was at uni—even now they were postgrads, and trainee teachers, and therefore seven times more boring than when they were proper students—should have posters of Michael fucking Buble on their walls, but all Louis could hear right now was a faint sort of desperate ringing in his ears. 

"You're going to come with me, right?" Niall was saying, leaning over to down the rest of his beer and poke Zayn in the arm. "And you as well, Zayn. This is going to be the best fucking mission."

Zayn rolled his eyes, but downed the rest of his vodka anyway. "Fine. This is going to be a disaster. I'm just going to stand there and watch, you know that, right?" 

Niall poked him again, probably just because he could. "Come on, Lou, say you'll come."

Louis shook his head. He wasn't going anywhere. He wasn't standing up or turning around or going _anywhere_ with Niall, especially if they were going to look for Liam fucking Payne, who was someone Louis never, ever wanted to encounter again, in a club or out of it. 

Liam Payne; Liam top-pop-pin-up Payne, whose last two albums had gone straight to number one, and who had just sold out his first arena tour in seventeen minutes. That Liam Payne, who—rumour had it—was in this very club, right this minute. 

Liam Payne, who Louis hadn't seen in person for three years and seven months, give or take. Not that Louis was counting. He was drunk; he couldn't remember how to count. It was just that some facts seemed indelibly burnt into his brain, and no amount of alcohol that looked and tasted and smelled faintly like paint stripper could make the timer in his head go away, or more helpfully, stop timing. 

"No—" he protested, but Niall was dragging him off his stool. 

"Adventure time, Tommo," he said, and Louis wasn't having that. Using his own words against him like that. He was the one who dragged them into adventures, and scrapes, and chance meetings with policemen in the middle of the night. It was just that anything involving Liam Payne wasn't an adventure; it was an exercise in the kind of mental trauma Louis had had quite enough of, thank you very much. 

"I don't want to," he complained, and his words bumped into each other, which he was fairly sure wasn't supposed to be happening. "Where's my drink?"

"I'll get you another one," Niall told him, over the heavy thump of the music. Louis fucking hated The Wanted. He wasn't entirely sure that Rihanna had a particular gait that required emulating, personally, but he was way too drunk for his The Wanted rant. 

"They're an affront to music," Louis mumbled, because even if Niall and Zayn were to be saved from his normal, extended-edition rant, they should at least have the abridged version. At least they'd split up now. 

"We know," Zayn said, one hand to Louis's waist. Louis suspected that Zayn was actually holding Louis up, but if that was the case, Louis was going to have to have words with him about his alcohol intake. Their placement was over; no more being a student teacher until after the next teaching block. No more being nice to very loud teenagers who couldn't be bothered to participate in his beautifully planned lessons—and they weren't bullshitted in the slightest, he _absolutely_ had objectives written down—because they thought that drama GCSE was a doss subject. Lie-ins and a lot of late nights were going to feature very heavily in his near future. It was going to be wonderful, so long as he didn't think about his coursework.

There was an awful lot of coursework. And job applications. They had to start applying for jobs in the next few weeks. 

"We're going to have words," Louis told Zayn, trying to look severe. Fuck, he hoped Liam wasn't here. His night was going to be totally and utterly fucking fucked if Liam was here. Louis tried very, very hard not to think about Liam. Ever. That whole period of his life was locked away in a box in his head, behind a door with a tiger sitting guard outside and a sign that said, _go the fuck away, Louis, herein lie dragons. And fire. And pointy stones. Don't come in_. Tonight the guard-tiger had a little hat on that lit up, and was wearing a duffel coat. 

Wow, this alcohol was good. 

"Fuck," Niall said, hand going heavy on Louis's shoulder. "There he is. Look. It's really him."

Louis swung around. Christ, he needed better impulse control. He should have walked away the moment the rumour had gone round the club that Liam was here. Surely the tiger in his head should have said something. He and that tiger were going to be having words in the morning. 

But—god. Liam. Liam was _here_ , in Louis's eye-line, and other people were looking at him too. Louis wasn't making him up out of his head, or anything. He was really here. 

The last time Louis had seen Liam in person, he'd been curly-haired and shyly determined, inching towards broad-shouldered, and with the best fucking voice Louis had ever heard. Now he was taller, and broader, and his hair was cut into a fauxhawk, tattoos sliding down over his arms towards his wrists. And everyone knew he was a fantastic singer. It was no longer Louis's secret, to have and to hold. 

Liam was standing by the edge of the dance floor, holding onto a bottle of something that looked alcoholic—and when had _that_ happened, Mr I don't really drink, not even if you've been on the internet to check to see if I can Payne—and leaning in to hear what a huge, beefy guy with massive muscles was saying. 

All the breath slid gently and irrevocably out of Louis's body. 

Liam wasn't looking in Louis's direction. Louis needed to walk away before Liam turned around; he needed to leave before Liam saw him. He needed to turn right the fuck around and get outside. He needed to go home, drink the remains of that bottle of Midori that neither Zayn nor Niall could stomach, have a serious conversation with an imaginary tiger, pass out, and wake up in the morning with little to zero memory of this entire night. Preferably zero. He'd be happy with zero.

But then Liam looked up, glancing round the club. The expression on his face was easy and open, and he was laughing at something the huge muscled guy was saying. There was a slow, pale shift in his expression when he clocked Louis standing there, staring at him. 

There was a desperate, breathless twist to Louis's gut as Liam's eyes met his. 

Three years and seven months. All those endless, endless months. 

Oh _god_. Niall was saying something to him, but Louis wasn't listening. He couldn't tear his gaze away from Liam's, because somewhere in his head an imaginary tiger couldn't keep an imaginary door shut in the face of imaginary marauding dragons, and it was all tipping out in his head, everything that Louis tried desperately not to think about, everything Liam-shaped and awful.

Liam hesitated; he stumbled a step forward, and then back again. He dumped his bottle down on the ledge by the edge of the dance floor, and then Louis was moving, and so was Liam, pushing past his entourage to meet Louis somewhere in the middle. Around them people were whispering, and pointing, but Louis didn't give a fuck. Just for this moment, he didn't give a fuck. 

"Lou—" Liam said, and then Louis was wrapping his arms around Liam, pulling him into the tightest, most desperate hug that Louis could manage, and Liam was hugging him back. 

He was hugging him back, hard. All Louis could do was hide his face in Liam's neck and breathe him in, like the last three years and seven months hadn't happened. Louis's head swam, and only seventy-eight per cent of that could be put down to the sheer volume of alcohol he'd drunk tonight. 

Liam's hands rested in the small of his back, and he pulled Louis even further in, dragging him closer, until there wasn't a breath between them, nothing but the heavy thump of their heartbeats as Louis squeezed his eyes tight shut and didn't let go. 

"Christ, Louis," Liam was saying, mouth pressed to the shell of Louis's ear. But someone was trying to separate them, pulling Liam away. Shoving Louis off him like Louis was doing something wrong. Telling him to keep away.

"Liam—" 

Two beefy security guards were in between them now, one of them pushing Louis back and telling him again to keep his distance. 

"It's fine—" Liam was trying to get to him, and Louis had no fucking idea what was happening. He was so fucking drunk, and Liam was just _there,_ and he stumbled as he tried to push security out of the way. 

"God, what part of _look but don't touch_ do you kids not understand?" one of the security guys told him, shoving him backwards. And that wasn't what Louis was doing at _all_ , didn't they get it? It was _Liam_ , his Liam, and it had been too long, and more than anything else in the world, Louis wanted to be hugging him again right this second. He tried to push the guy out of the way, but it was like trying to move a brick wall. A brick wall who pushed back.

"Don't touch him," Niall said fiercely, coming out of nowhere and getting in between Louis and the security guard. "What's Lou done to you? Leave him alone."

Louis wasn't entirely sure how him hugging Liam got the three of them chucked out of the club, but one second Liam was there, and the next he was gone, and two burly dudes in cheap suits were shoving him and Niall and Zayn out the fire exit and onto the street. 

Louis stumbled off the kerb and into the road. Zayn grabbed him, pulling him back onto the pavement, and Louis bumped into the wall. He put his head in his hands. There was a fairly high chance he was going to vom in the very near future, and if he was, he'd quite like it to be _now_ , when he could happily forget that he'd ever seen Liam again. 

"Well," Zayn said. "That was—"

The fire door opened again, and a different guy in a suit was thrusting a phone in Louis's direction. "You fucking kids," he said, as if Louis wasn't an actual adult a few months away from an actual teaching qualification, and Liam wasn't two years younger than Louis in the first place. "What did you think shoving your phone at a pop star was going to do, huh? Liam doesn't want it, so take it the fuck back. And go home, will you? Hopefully in the morning you'll regret lobbing yourself at a guy who just wanted a night out, fuck."

After the door closed behind him, Louis looked down at the phone in his hand. 

"That's an iPhone," Niall said. 

"Yes," Louis said, because it was. 

"That's not your phone," Niall said. 

"No," Louis said, because it wasn't. 

"Is anyone else confused?"

Louis shoved the phone in Niall's general direction, and threw up against the wall of the club. 

Everything after that was kind of a blur.

~*~

Louis woke up at five in the morning to the insistently loud buzz of a text message arriving on an iPhone that wasn't his and didn't belong in his house. The screen lit up, and the message shone bright and loud right there in the middle, just where Louis was looking.

_Louis the passcode is yor birthaaaaay_

Louis made a sad, gurgling kind of a noise, and hid his face in one of Zayn's hoodies, which he appeared to be using as a pillow. He suspected Zayn was going to kill him for that; Zayn didn't like it when people were awful and disgusting around his belongings, and Louis could tell even without opening his eyes again that he was at his most revolting. He was half on and off the sofa, for a start, and he smelled like stale vom. He was only wearing one leg of his jeans, and no t-shirt, and he was wrapped in the only table cloth they owned—which they'd nicked from the hotel restaurant where Louis had managed a whole seven weeks as a waiter in second year, before being sacked for skipping work in favour of going to a uni ball. 

His stomach rolled, and he only just made it to the yucca plant by the window before he threw up again. It hadn't actually been a yucca plant since their third year, when Zayn had rebelled and tipped an entire bottle of cinnamon Aftershock into the plant pot so that he wouldn't have to take another shot. Now it was an ex-yucca plant, and probably even more so now since he'd just been sick all over it.

He contemplated crawling upstairs and into bed for about five seconds, and then stumbled face first onto the sofa instead, because it was easier. 

A moment later he opened his eyes again, and reached for the iPhone that wasn't his and didn't belong in his house. The message was still there:

_Louis the passcode is yor birthaaaaay_

He typed in 2-4-1-2.

The phone unlocked. The background was a picture of a puppy with a very fluffy tail. Louis had seen that puppy before, the last time he'd done a masochistic run through Liam Payne's Instagram. 

"Fucking hell," Louis managed, reaching for the bottle of water that they tended to keep down the side of the sofa for occasions like this. Fuck knows how long it had been there, but his mouth tasted like a grave, so stale water had to be better. 

He dribbled a bit on the phone screen, and tried to wipe it off with the tablecloth. 

"Fuck," he said, and buried his face in Zayn's hoodie. 

~*~

The next time he woke up, it was because someone who was both evil and awful was leaning on the doorbell. 

"Fuck off," he managed, pulling Zayn's hoodie over his head. His head pounded. 

Magically, the doorbell stopped chiming. Maybe Louis had special powers. It was about time someone recognised his greatness. Oh god, he was going to be sick again. Maybe if he stayed very, very still the feeling would pass, and he could go back to wishing he was dead, like any normal person with a hangover from hell. 

"Um," Niall said, from the living room doorway, a minute later. Louis cracked open an eye. "So, um, Liam Payne's here to see you? In our house?"

"No, he's not," Louis said, from where he was still mostly hiding under Zayn's hoodie. He'd had dreams that started like this, and no one needed to wake up in the middle of the night tearful because it turned out Liam wasn't really there. It was all terribly shaming and no one needed to know that it had ever happened. That was what conversations with imaginary tigers and drinking until you passed out were for. 

"Um," someone else who sounded a lot like Liam Payne said. "I sort of am?"

Louis didn't move for a very long moment. "Christ," he said finally, peering out from under Zayn's hoodie. "You're in my house. Am I making you up? Are you a hangover hallucination?"

Liam—his Liam—was standing in his doorway, wearing skinny jeans and a tight white t-shirt and a hoodie. Louis would definitely vote hangover hallucination, except that the Liam in his head was three years and seven months younger than this, and had curly hair and couldn't pin him to the bed as easily as this Liam probably could. And his Liam had never met Niall, but this Liam was standing next to him in Louis's living room. His Liam would never have worn hi-top trainers, either. He should have done; they looked really good.

"Do those really exist?" Liam asked. 

"Don't know," Louis said, without moving. He was still holding the iPhone in his hand. His sweaty hand. Liam's iPhone. "Is your passcode really my birthday?"

"It's a memorable four digit number," Liam said, with a glance at Niall. His cheeks were pink. 

_Three years and seven months_ , Louis thought, as his headache took up residence somewhere behind his temples. "This is one of them big new iPhones, isn't it?"

"Got it last month."

"Your passcode is my birthday."

"Memorable four digit number," Liam said, again. 

"Not memorable enough to wish me an actual happy birthday, though," Louis said, only half wishing he was dead as his hangover beat a merry drumbeat in his head. 

"Didn't think you'd want me to," Liam said. "What with, you know. Everything."

Oh, yeah. Louis hadn't really thought of that. 

"So, um—" Niall looked between the two of them. "You two know each other, then?"

"Something like that." Louis tried to stumble to his feet, but it was kind of difficult because he was still a bit drunk, and he was wearing a tablecloth. Nausea rolled in his belly. "Do you want tea?"

Liam looked just as adorably awkward as he always had. It had been endearingly charming when they'd first met, when Liam had been a shy, determined sixteen year old with the voice of an angel—a _hot_ angel, but whatever—and Louis had been fucking around re-taking his A levels and in need of distraction. It didn't stop being charming now, even though the living room smelled like death and Louis was still wearing a tablecloth. "If it's all right."

"It's all right. I'm making it anyway," Louis said, tripping over his jeans as he tried to kick them off his foot. "Christ, I was sick on the yucca."

Niall wrinkled his nose. "You're getting rid of that, mate." He turned to Liam. "We're not normally this revolting."

"We are," Louis said. He was wearing his pants and a tablecloth. This wasn't exactly how he'd imagined any reunion with Liam going. In his head he was usually wearing clothes. And he tended to smell better in his imagination, too. 

He made it past Liam and Niall with as much dignity as he could muster, which wasn't much, all things considered. Liam was all clean and fresh and smelled like the same fucking aftershave he'd used back when—well, before. Louis got halfway down the hall before he frowned, turning around. "How did you know where I lived, anyway?"

"Um," Liam said again. He never used to be this tongue-tied. Wasn't being a top-pop-pin-up supposed to make you better at answering questions? "There's a tracker on my phone. And I pulled in a favour."

"Must be magic, being a pop star," Niall said, from behind Liam. "It's eight in the morning on a Saturday. I want to pull in favours first thing on a Saturday. That'd be fucking sick."

"That's Niall," Louis said, pulling the tablecloth over his head and wrapping it round himself, as close to a shroud as he could manage. "He likes life."

"I do," Niall agreed. "You two going to explain how you know each other now?"

Louis didn't meet Liam's eyes. He concentrated on filling the kettle from the tap instead. "I knew him before he was famous," he said, after a loaded silence that the hangover monkeys in Louis's head continued to drum through. The hangover monkeys were the bane of Louis's existence. Them and that bloody tiger. 

"You never said," Niall plonked himself down at their very, very messy kitchen table and swept a pile of unopened letters to one side. 

"Yeah, well." Louis didn't have anything to say to that. He might do, if it wasn't for the impending avalanche of a hangover that would normally threaten to ruin his day. 

Except: Liam was here. Liam was _here_ , in his kitchen, and Louis was boiling the kettle instead of fucking looking at him, and something about this picture was very, very wrong. 

He dumped the kettle back on the side without bothering to shove the lead in, and turned back around. "Liam—" he said, and if he sounded a bit broken, then there was a hangover taking root at the base of his skull, and he could definitely blame it on that, and not on the three years and seven months that pounded relentlessly over his skin like a pulse beat.

"Lou," Liam said, and he sounded a bit broken too, and Louis really, really didn't know what to do with that. 

So he did what he'd always done, back in the day, when Liam had sounded any kind of broken. He barrelled into him, shoving his face into the curve of Liam's neck, and Liam might be broader and taller and stronger and bigger than the last time they'd done this, but he was still the same Liam under all of that. His arms still wrapped around Louis like holding him close was something important. 

Liam's hand found its way into Louis's hair, and Louis struggled to keep a hold on the tablecloth and wrap his arms around Liam's waist too, but he did his best. He probably smelled like death, but he'd smelled worse in his life, and Liam hadn't pushed him away then. 

Although back then, they'd been tied together in different ways, and maybe the rules were different this time around. Maybe they shouldn't even be touching. Maybe Louis should be keeping a better hold on himself. Maybe a lot of things. Maybe the fragile web of lies Louis had built up all that time ago was threatening to crumble, and Louis should be trying to keep a better hold of it all, but right now he was hungover and Liam smelled like everything he'd tried so hard to forget, and just this once he wanted to give into it, and be hugged. 

Louis pressed even closer, his nose pushed up against Liam's throat. This was all backwards and upside down and wrong. He shouldn't be doing this. He shouldn't have hugged Liam last night and he shouldn't be doing it now, either. The last time they'd stood like this, three and a half years ago, both of them had been crying, and Louis had been trying to keep it all inside, the desperate part of him that didn't want to let Liam go, that wanted to beg him to stay. 

He'd lied instead, lies that had twisted and caught in his throat. _You'll always be my best friend_ and _you'll always have me_ and _I'm so sorry_ and _I wish it could be different_. 

And the whole time, underneath, _I didn't mean to stop loving you_. 

He'd made Liam believe him, at least, even if it had torn him apart. 

Even if it was still tearing him apart. 

Even if he still had no idea how he was supposed to put himself back together. 

Because the thing was, you didn't meet your soul mate when you were still in sixth form. You didn't get married before you were twenty and make it work. It wouldn't have lasted, not in the end, and Liam's dreams had been worth more than a stupid marriage to his first boyfriend that no one, not even their parents, had approved of. 

Anyway, you didn't stay in love with someone three years and seven months after you'd driven them away; you just didn't. 

Louis just wanted it to _stop_. 

"Well then," Niall said, jumping to his feet. "It's definitely time for me and Zayn to go to the shops. Milk won't buy itself. Probably important we leave right the fuck now, actually. You carry on, lads, don't mind me. Just, um, hug away, chaps. Don't rush on my account to explain what the fuck's going on, or anything. Perfect time to go down the shops, before the crowds."

Louis definitely did not point out that before nine on a Saturday was still the middle of the night for Zayn, and that they probably already had milk, since Zayn was fairly good at sending one or other of them out to the twenty-four hour shop if it looked like they were running out, and that Niall was still in his pyjamas. Louis hid his face in Liam's shoulder, and tried not to think about how much he'd missed Liam, and how long it had been since they'd celebrated being married with a bottle of pink fizzy wine and a dine in for ten pounds meal deal from Marks and Spencer's. Or how Louis had celebrated the two of them splitting up with two months at the bottom of a vodka bottle and a constant fucking headache that never went the fuck away. 

"You smell awful," Liam said, his mouth pressed to Louis's throat. He kept pulling Louis closer, even though there wasn't anywhere nearer that Louis could be. 

"You don't," Louis said, before he'd thought about it too much. He should let go; he should shove Liam's phone back at him and tell him to go on his merry way and go back to trying to conquer America. Liam was hot property right now. He didn't need anything linking him back to a failed teenage marriage to a loser who was only just managing to finish uni now, three years later than his peers. One year re-taking year twelve and another two years in a bedsit in Wolverhampton, and now he was twenty-five and still studying. Part of it served him right for picking a PGCE after his education degree in the first place, but at least at the end of this year—fingers crossed—he was going to come out with an actual teaching qualification. Think of it: Louis Tomlinson, qualified. 

Not a loser anymore. 

He could hear Niall thundering down the stairs, dragging a complaining Zayn after him. 

"We're chucking the yucca," Niall yelled. "Don't say we never do nothing for you."

"If you've thrown up on my hoodie I'll fucking kill you," Zayn called down the hall. He threw a _love you_ after him as the door slammed behind them. Zayn could be fucking terrifying if he tried to be. 

Louis let out a breath, and closed his eyes.

"Do you think we should talk?" Liam said finally, without letting go of him. His hand rested on the back of Louis's neck, holding him close. 

Louis didn't think anything. Not thinking was what had got him here in the first place. "No," he said, because he was nothing if not truthful about how much he hated talking about shit. There were too many lies he had to maintain, and he was tired, and hungover, and so, so tired of trying to do the right thing. He relented, shifting so that he could press his cheek to Liam's shoulder. "I suppose. Maybe."

"There's probably stuff we should talk about."

Yeah, like the fact that two weeks after Liam's eighteenth birthday, they'd spent a week off work shagging in their shared bedsit, and in between times, queuing up at the council offices to get a licence for a civil partnership. 

Like the fact that when they'd split up and Liam had gone off to live the dream, neither of them had ever talked about _not_ being civil-partnered any more. 

Like the fact that Liam had been his husband once, and he still fucking was, and not just on paper, not for Louis. It might have been three years and seven months since they'd seen each other, but Louis wasn't ready for Liam to ask him for a divorce. 

He wouldn't ever be ready for that. 

"All right," he said, pulling back a bit. "Let me just go and like—I don't know. I'm going to shower, all right? I'll be five minutes. Make some tea, or something."

Liam nodded, letting him go. He fumbled with the cuffs of his hoodie. "All right."

~*~

The first time Louis had seen Liam, Louis had been sneaking out of the open day at the University of Derby, and trying to find the nearest place to hang out that wasn't filled with people talking about how important his future was. He was, as these things stood, a bit of a failure. He'd messed up year twelve once, had scraped past his AS levels second time around, and instead of knowing what the fuck he was supposed to be doing with his life, he was spending the day at a university open day instead of filling in his UCAS application with the rest of his year. 

Liam had been hanging round the benches by the edge of the lawn, also clearly skiving off the open day, and Louis had sat down next to him and offered him a crisp. 

He still didn't know why he'd done it, since going up to complete strangers and sharing food with them wasn't actually on his list of things he did every day, but something about Liam had caught his attention even before they'd said two words to each other. 

But that always had been Liam, managing to capture all of Louis's attention in any given circumstance. 

One day together skiving off the open day, and that had translated into the next three years of Louis's life. Liam had been Louis's everything since approximately ten seconds after meeting him, and it was inevitable from the word go that Louis was going to fuck it all up. There was no way that it was ever going to end well. 

He'd been lucky to have it last as long as it did, really.

~*~

He showered away the smell of stale alcohol and vomit, and tried to ignore the way his heart was pounding. Liam was _downstairs_ , in his house. Nothing had changed since the last time Louis had seen him: he still wanted him. He still craved Liam's touch and the way he hugged Louis so tight. He wanted to make him laugh and slide his hand under Liam's shirt and make him his tea just like he liked it, and he wanted to do all of that and more, every day forever. Just like he always had. 

Because this was the thing: when Liam was around Louis couldn't think of anything else, and that was, and always had been, completely fucking terrifying. 

He went downstairs in a pair of tracky bottoms and a t-shirt, his damp hair hidden under a red knitted beanie. 

Liam was doing the washing up in Louis's kitchen. The table was neat and tidy, with all their mail sorted out into four piles, one for him, one for Zayn, one for Niall, and one for people who didn't live here anymore. There was a pile of old newspapers and magazines, and their four, dog-eared student cookbooks were stacked up on the windowsill. The hob looked as if it had been given a good going over with some Cif, too. 

"How long was I in the shower?" Louis asked. "Because you've cleaned the kitchen."

Liam looked a bit pink. "I just—sorry. I shouldn't have—"

"It's all right." Louis shoved his hands in his pockets for something to do. "It was always all right. It's just that—you don't have to. You never had to. Anyway, you're a pop star. Surely you've got minions to do this kind of thing for you now."

"No," Liam said. "No minions."

"I'd have minions if I was rich and famous. I wouldn't do my washing up if I was rich."

"You don't do it now," Liam said.

"Oi."

Liam still looked a bit awkward. "I didn't know what to do," he said. "I thought I might as well be helpful."

Louis nodded. His headache was still there. "Did you miss me?" he asked, before he could stop himself. That wasn't a fair question; Liam hadn't been the one who'd refused to stay friends. 

"Christ, Lou."

"Sorry." Louis flicked the switch on the kettle. "Ignore me, I'm a dickhead."

Liam leaned back against the sink. "I wasn't the one who didn't want to be friends anymore. You can't ask me if I missed you, fuck. That's not fair."

"I know." Louis really did know. 

"You're the one that didn't love me anymore."

"I know," Louis said again. It had been the largest, most untrue thing he'd ever said in his whole entire life. The one time in his life he hadn't been selfish and clung to what he wanted more than anything else, ever. The one time he'd given something up because it was better for _them_ , and not for him. 

"You were my best friend in the world, you know," Liam said after a minute, when Louis had been looking at the kettle for far too long. 

"Mine too," Louis said, since that part at least he could admit to.

"You swore we'd still be friends."

Louis nodded, the lump in his throat thick and unyielding. He blinked down at the two mugs on the counter, and dumped two teabags in as the kettle clicked off. 

"Why'd you lie? When I came to the flat after, you didn't want anything to do with me."

"Too painful." Louis poured water over the teabags. His hand shook. 

Liam didn't say anything to that, and Louis flopped the teabags around the mugs with the back of a spoon and then dumped them down on the counter, reaching past Liam for the fridge and the milk. 

"You were the one that broke up with _me_ ," Liam said, once Louis had pushed the tea towards him, and the bag of sugar. "You were the one who didn't love me anymore. I don't get how it was too painful for you, when I was the one with the broken heart."

So this was what this felt like. 

"I hated that I'd done that to you." Louis took a gulp of his too-hot tea, and promptly burnt his tongue. He coughed. "I thought it would be easier like this. I thought it would be easier for you this way."

"You threw my stuff away."

Lie. He'd kept it all, every single thing that Liam had left behind, every single scrap of paper and ratty old odd sock and half-chewed biro. "Only a box. And I took it to the charity shop." He cupped his mug of tea close to his chest. "Come on, come through to the living room." He hoped it didn't smell like sick in there. 

He sat down at one end of the sofa, and put his tea down by his foot, drawing his knee up to his chest. Niall had opened a window at the same time as removing the yucca, and it didn't smell too much like someone had died in here, which was probably a good thing. 

Liam sat down at the other end of the sofa, and tried to neatly fold up Zayn's hoodie that Louis had used as a pillow. 

"Just shove it on the floor," Louis said. "It's revolting anyway."

Liam finished folding it into four and put it by his feet. He stared down at his lap. "Why'd you hug me last night? I thought—I thought you didn't give a shit about me anymore, but then...I don't know. I saw you and everything else just stopped. But I still don't know why you hugged me. Or why you hugged me this morning. You were the one who didn't want me around anymore."

There wasn't a way of saying, _I gave you up so you could have your dream_ without actually saying, _I gave you up so you could have your dream,_ so Louis didn't say it. "I missed you," he said finally, since that could be true in any possible world. "I've always missed you. I saw you and I just—" he swallowed. "I missed you, okay? I missed you."

There was something written across Liam's face that looked like pure, unadulterated desperation. 

Louis looked down at his knees, and tried to remind himself of every single thing that Liam had achieved without him. Every success and celebration and top five single and number one album. Every time his record company signed off on another step closer to his dream of being a famous pop star. Every meeting he'd had that hadn't ended with a stark refusal from a record company executive because Liam had brought his husband along to sit in reception and wait for him. 

Once was enough. 

"I missed you," he said again, after a minute. He didn't look up. 

Liam laughed at that. He sounded a little bitter. "I loved you so much," he said. "I've never loved anyone like I loved you. I missed you every day."

"Same," Louis said softly, after a bit. It couldn't hurt to admit that, could it? "You were the love of my fucking life."

But you didn't meet the love of your life skiving off a uni open day in Derby, you really didn't. You didn't meet the love of your life when you were still at school. No wonder it had all gone wrong. Louis had always loved too hard and too long. 

"Are they your best friends?" Liam asked, a little hesitantly. "Niall and Zayn?"

Louis nodded. He picked at the skin by his thumb nail. It didn't make the ache in his chest disappear at all. "Is Harry Styles yours?" He'd seen the pictures: pop star Liam Payne and singer and man about town Harry Styles, living the high life and getting photographed doing it. 

"Yeah," Liam said. 

"Are you—the two of you?" Louis shrugged, awkward. "Is he your boyfriend?"

"No," Liam said. "He's got someone else. We're just mates. Best mates. Is there someone—have you got anyone?"

Louis shook his head. He hadn't been celibate for the last almost-four years, but there hadn't been anyone or anything that had lasted past a couple of weeks. Young and fancy-free, he'd called it out loud. In love and still married and hopeless, he'd said in his head. 

"I saw you last night and—I don't know, okay. I probably shouldn't have hugged you back, but, like, literally you were the only person in that club to me."

"I know." Louis felt the same. "Why'd you give me your phone?"

Liam looked a bit helpless. "I couldn't—you couldn't leave. I couldn't find you again and not talk to you. I just couldn't. I'm sorry. I know you think I should have got over you, like, a million years ago or something, and you probably think I'm a total fucking creep or something, but I can't help it. You're still my best friend. I know that's stupid."

"You're not stupid. Or a creep." He kept thinking, _your passcode is my birthday_. "Do you remember that time when we were so broke we ate nothing but Asda smart price supernoodles for like, two whole weeks?"

"Yeah. I remember. Still can't eat chicken supernoodles."

"You're famous, you shouldn't have to."

"Minions, I forgot."

"Right." Louis chewed his thumb. "There's all this stuff in my life that only you know about. No one else wants to vom at the smell of supernoodles. Nobody else remembers drinking Lambrini from the bottle because we didn't have glasses."

"Classy," Liam said. "Do you remember that caff down the road that used to do you a pint of tea in a glass if you asked?"

"What about The Eyrie? Best pub breakfast ever. All those hash browns."

"Bacon sandwiches, you mean."

Louis smiled at that, and tried to ignore the way his stomach got all caught up at the memory. "Do you remember—" He trailed off.

Liam nodded. "Yeah, I remember." 

They'd got married at nine forty-five in the morning on a Thursday, suited and booted and clinging to each other like getting married less than a fortnight after Liam's eighteenth birthday was the best idea either of them had ever had. Two witnesses pulled in off the street, and then they'd gone to the supermarket afterwards, just the two of them, and had gone home to breakfast on the best fry up in the land. 

"I loved you so much," Liam said softly. 

"I know," Louis said, and he didn't mean to cry. He hadn't meant to do anything other than send Liam on his merry way, but he'd been keeping this a secret for years, all locked up and deep down inside and it hurt. It _hurt_. "I loved you more than anything."

"Don't cry," Liam said. "You'll set me off." It was too late; Louis watched as he wiped away tears with the back of his hand. 

"Sorry." Louis tried to catch his breath. He'd done so well, all this time. So, so well. 

"Why did you have to stop loving me?" Liam asked. "What did I do to make you stop wanting me?"

Nothing. Nothing. "I don't know," he lied. "It just happened. I'm so, so sorry." He wiped his nose on the back of his hand. "Is it worth it? Being a pop star? Is it everything you dreamed of?"

Liam shot him a look. "What do you mean, _is it worth it_?"

"It's what you always wanted, right? You got what you always wanted."

"I suppose," Liam said. He shook his head, and Louis's heart plummeted. Please don't let it all have been for nothing. "What I wanted was to sing, and have you, but you didn't want me anymore."

Louis shoved his hands under his thighs to stop them from shaking, because the front door was opening, and Zayn and Niall were back, boisterously proclaiming their return with a very loud conversation about the greatest hits of Journey. 

Liam wiped his eyes on his sleeve and tried to look like he hadn't just been crying. 

It didn't matter that Louis knew that what he'd done was for the best. It still fucking hurt more than anything. He'd been alone for so long. 

"All right, lads," Niall said, dumping his bags in the hall and tripping into the living room. "Ready to tell us why there's a pop star on our sofa and why you never told us you knew him, Tommo?"

Zayn made a complaining noise out in the hall about stuff that needed to go in the fridge. He gathered up the bags Niall had dropped without coming into the living room, and headed into the kitchen. 

"Stick the kettle on, there's a love," Niall called after him. He plonked himself down in the armchair. "We fucked off out of here for like, half an hour, or whatever. The least you could do is tell us why. Have you any idea how grumpy Zayn is before nine o'clock on a Saturday? Double it, because he's hungover."

"I'm not," Zayn yelled from the kitchen. "Who cleaned our kitchen?"

"Liam did," Louis said, without looking at either Liam or Niall. 

"What the fuck," Niall said. "I mean, thanks, dude, but you didn't have to do that. You're a pop star."

"Louis was in the shower," Liam said, going a bit pink. God, Louis had missed that. 

"You could have had a cup of tea and nosed through our mail," Niall suggested. "That's what I would have done."

Zayn stuck his head round the door. "How did you get that tomato stain off the hob? I tried getting that off last month, and it went right through the cloth. Thought it was proper ground on."

"Um," Liam said, shrugging awkwardly. "Elbow grease?"

"Huh," Zayn said. He sat down on the arm of the armchair, next to Niall. "So, uh, like Niall said—"

"That's my hoodie," Liam said softly, pointing at Zayn. 

Oh, _Christ_. Louis's head shot up.

"It's not," Zayn said, looking down at his chest. "It's Louis's. It's his favourite. I'm only wearing it because he's a dickhead who probably fucking vommed on mine last night, and one bad hoodie experience deserves another."

"It's mine," Liam said doggedly. 

Louis swallowed. Liam was right; it was his hoodie. It was a faded navy hoodie that had been worn a hundred, million times, but still had the paint stains on the sleeve and across the waistband from where they'd tried to paint a wall of their bedsit a "signature red" the weekend after they'd got married. When Liam had left, Louis had hidden it under the bed, and when Liam had come back for it a week later, Louis had pretended he'd sent the last box of Liam's belongings to the charity shop, with the hoodie inside. "Liam—" 

Liam shook his head. "You told me you'd sent that to the charity shop. I came back for it, and you said you'd got rid of it. My favourite hoodie."

"I thought I had," Louis lied. "I found it when I moved out."

"And what, you just thought, wow, look at this hoodie which has magically hidden itself for ages in our tiny fucking bedsit, I know just what I'll do with it, I'll _keep it and wear it and wear it_? It's all faded, Lou."

"Bedsit?" Niall asked. 

"Yeah, that's exactly it," Louis said. "Wait—no. It was just—it was there, and I wore it, and I suppose I kept it. It doesn't mean anything. It never meant anything."

"No. Right." Liam shook his head. "Before, when you said, 'was it worth it'? What did you mean? Was what worth it?"

"Nothing. I meant—nothing. Like, was it worth all the hard work? Being famous and everything?"

"That's not what you meant. God, Lou. I literally have no idea what's going on in your head. I never did."

"I didn't ask you here," Louis snapped, because his heart felt like it was going to beat right out of his chest, and not in a good way. "You're the one who showed up. It's just a fucking hoodie, it doesn't mean anything. I'll chuck it out right now, is that what you want?"

Liam stood up. "This was a really shit idea," he said. He grabbed his phone from the coffee table. "I just—I can't do this again, all right? It was bad enough the first time around. I don't know why I didn't learn then, you know? Stay the fuck away from you, because you'll break my fucking heart. Again."

Louis rubbed at his eyes with his fingertips, and didn't stand up to stop him. He didn't do anything, just like the last time. "Yeah. Probably a good plan."

"Right." Liam shook his head. "God. I thought—fuck. You hugged me. _You_ hugged me _._ Fuck. I just—I don't know why I thought it was worth going back. It hurt enough the first time."

When he walked out, he did it quietly, shutting the front door behind him with barely a whisper.

"Louis," Niall said, after a minute. 

Louis put his face in his hands. "Give me my hoodie. I just—I want my hoodie, okay? I want my fucking hoodie."

Zayn bundled it off and into Louis's lap, and Louis pulled it on without meeting either of their gazes. He pulled his knees up to his chest, and the hood up over his ears, and when Zayn tugged him into a hug, Louis went awkwardly, hiding his face in the curve of Zayn's neck. Niall came over and joined in, arms around them both. 

"What the fuck just happened?" Niall asked. He was rubbing slow circles into Louis's back. 

"Nothing that wasn't for the best," Louis said, in a muffled voice. 

"Lou, were you and Liam Payne—" Zayn trailed off. 

Louis squeezed his eyes tight shut, and nodded. He didn't know what he was saying yes to. All of it, probably, and a bit more besides.

"Oh," Niall said softly, and hugged him tighter. 

~*~

The doorbell went when they were half way through watching _Avengers Assemble_ that evening. Louis was under a blanket on the sofa, hoodie still up over his head, hands deep in the sleeves, cheek pressed to Zayn's thigh, Zayn's hand to his shoulder. He wasn't concentrating on the telly, and hadn't been since the moment Niall and Zayn had sprung to attention and demanded a film marathon to take Louis's mind off whatever it was that he wasn't telling them. 

It wasn't that it was worth keeping it a secret anymore, but Louis couldn't find the words to say, _Reader, I married him_ , so he didn't say anything at all. 

"Doorbell," Zayn said, when neither Louis nor Niall stood up. 

"They can fuck the fuck off," Louis said, tugging the blanket up over his head so that only his nose was showing. "Tell them to fuck off, whoever they are."

Niall gave a loud, exaggerated sigh and stumbled out into the hall. 

"Tell them to get lost," Louis called after him, louder than he perhaps should have done. "None of us want to read _The Watchtower_ and if it's Avon their lipstick's rubbish."

It wasn't Avon, and it wasn't Jehovah's Witnesses. "I've been thinking," Liam said, from the doorway. "Nice hoodie, by the way."

"I was cold," Louis said quickly, scrambling up into a sitting position. "I was going to chuck it out."

Liam leaned against the doorframe. "All right, lads?" he said. Niall plonked himself down in the armchair again, and Zayn raised a hand in an awkward kind of a wave. "So, like. I've been thinking. And I was on the phone to Ruth, and then Harry, and then Nicola. And my sisters never thought it made any sense at the time, either."

"'s'just a hoodie," Louis said. 

"But like," Liam went on, ignoring Louis, "I kept going over and over some stuff in my head, and I don't know anymore, because none of this makes sense. You hugging me last night, and this morning, and you keeping my hoodie, and then you asking me if it was worth it. And I kept thinking, was what worth it?"

"I just said it wrong. It didn't mean anything."

Liam shook his head. "If I ask you something, are you going to be honest with me, for once?"

Louis shrugged. "I'm always honest."

"Just—for once, Lou. If I ask you something, will you tell me the truth? And don't like, I don't know, try and make me feel better or spare my feelings or anything. I just think that maybe, just this once, I deserve the truth, right? You owe me that, at least."

Louis didn't say anything to that. He couldn't.

"Louis?"

"Fine," Louis snapped, in spite of himself. "Whatever, you can have the truth."

"You swear? To infinity and beyond?"

Louis couldn't look at him. His eyes burned. "To infinity and beyond." 

Liam nodded, and glanced at Niall, and then at Zayn. Louis didn't shoo either of them out of the room, because he couldn't hide any of this from them any longer, and he didn't even want to. God, if he was going to be heartbroken again, the least he could do was get people to make him cups of tea when he put the vodka bottle down. It had to be better than doing it alone. The imaginary tiger in his head wasn't the best company in the world. 

"Fine," Liam said. "Just—right. All right. When you told me you didn't love me anymore, um, were you telling me the truth?"

Louis's mouth dropped open. 

"Lou, you promised. You _promised_. You don't break a to infinity and beyond." Desperation slid its way across Liam's clenched jaw. "Please. All this time, I thought you didn't want me."

"I didn't."

"You _liar_ ," Liam said. "You told me you didn't want to see me again, but you hugged me. You didn't hug me like someone you never wanted to see again. I don't get it, and you promised you'd tell me the truth." 

"It doesn't change anything," Louis said, to the soundtrack of his heart breaking. Again. "Telling you the truth doesn't change anything."

"It might. Fuck, Louis, when you told me you didn't want to be married to me anymore, how much of that was a lie?" 

Niall said, _fuck me_. Zayn hissed in a breath. 

And Louis couldn't; he _couldn't_. "All of it," he said, and his chest felt like it was being cleaved into two, painful and desperate and terrible. "Every last breath."

"Oh god," Liam managed. "But why? You broke my heart. I fucking loved you."

Louis shrugged, and tried not to break apart in front of them all. "Because you were worth so much more than some fucking stupid marriage to some fucking loser, that's why. Because god, have you heard you sing? And they weren't ever going to sign you if you had a husband. You got a _no_ from that dickhead from Sony because I was waiting in the fucking reception for you. Because of _me_. You deserved like, the fucking world. I couldn't give you any of that. We had like, that shit bedsit and no proper wedding pictures and not even real rings and we had bacon sandwiches in bed after. Shit jobs and no future and you are worth about a million of me, do you not get that?" He wiped his nose on the sleeve of his hoodie. "A _million_ , Liam."

"You don't know that's why I didn't get a yes from Sony. And it wasn't your choice, Louis," Liam said after the longest minute, where the tension snapped out taut like razor wire. Liam looked desperately angry. "God, not your fucking choice."

This time when he left, he slammed the door after him, and Louis thought, _I've done it now._

Zayn slid his hand into Louis's, and Niall came over to press a kiss to Louis's temple. 

"You right royally fucked that one up, didn't you, love?" Niall said, arms around Louis's shoulders. 

"No," Louis said softly, and gave in to the sob that was caught in his throat, burying his face in Niall's shirt. 

~*~

In the end, it was Niall who wouldn't let him drink himself stupid. Normally Niall was the first person to crack open the alcohol, but this time he was resolute, and wouldn't let Louis anywhere near the kitchen cupboards. 

"Fuck this," he said succinctly, as Louis tried to rugby tackle him out of the way. "How long have we fucking known you, Lou? Four years, almost, and this whole time you've been _married_?"

"Split up," Louis said, his eye on the prize. "Separated." The kitchen counter held a dusty bottle of port that they'd picked up from God knows where, and if he wasn't going to be allowed anywhere near the actual alcohol cupboard, he'd settle for the port. Anything so long as he didn't have to think about Liam. He tried to duck under Niall's arm, digging his fingers into Niall's hip. He could play dirty. 

Niall shoved him backwards. "No," he said. "I'm pissed off at you, dickhead. Stop being a knobhead and come and fucking talk to us."

"I don't want to talk," Louis said. "I want to get wankered, and forget about Liam fucking Payne, and how he's the worst person in the world, and I want to wake up tomorrow and forget I ever met him, all right?"

"Like Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind," Zayn said, from behind him. "Lou, you don't want to forget."

"I _do_." Louis could be as stubborn as anyone, given the opportunity. Fuck this shit, there was a whole world out there, and they'd all sell him whatever alcohol he wanted. He was going down the offy, and he'd buy whatever they had, and then he'd come back here and barricade himself in his bedroom and forget any of this had happened. 

"No way," Niall said, grabbing his arms. "I know what you're thinking."

"Let me go." Louis tried to get away, but Zayn had joined in now, pushing him back against the wall. "I just, I just want a drink, okay? I want a fucking drink."

"You want to pretend it isn't happening," Niall told him. "You can't make it go away by wishing, love."

Louis tried to kick them both in the shins. His chest felt like it was going to explode. His heart hurt. "I don't want it to be happening," he said, catching Zayn on the ankle. "I just want to forget."

"I know," Zayn said. "But it's still going to be there when you're sober again."

"Well, I just won't get fucking sober, then." A sob caught in his throat. Liam, his Liam. 

Zayn was looking at him with pity in his eyes, and abruptly the fight went out of Louis. He sank back against the wall. 

"Liam's the best person in the world," Louis told them, because he couldn't not, and Niall nodded, sympathetic. "I did the right thing."

Zayn's expression didn't change, but he did meet Niall's gaze over the top of his head.

Louis closed his eyes. "I did the right thing. I gave him up."

"I know," Niall told him, softly. "You brave, brave, stupid thing."

When Louis started to cry, they bundled him up into a hug, and sat down with him right where he was, on the sticky carpet at the bottom of the stairs, and Louis let himself sob. 

~*~

Louis woke up the following morning half in and out of Zayn's bed. Zayn was spread-eagled over the rest of it, arms and legs out like a giant X. Niall was snoring on a pile of Zayn's clothes by the door. These were his best friends; they'd been through everything together, ever since the first week of first year, when they'd banded together, the only three normal people in a block of student flats that was entirely peopled by weirdoes. Louis—still broken inside and not telling anyone about it—had spent most of that first term making friends with the inside of a vodka bottle, going out every night and becoming a perpetual Student Union attendee. Niall's flatmates had included a late night trumpet player and a revolting farter who never owned up to it—something Niall couldn't ever understand—whereas Zayn was lucky enough to get the noisy guys who had sex with their girlfriends on the kitchen table and wouldn't let Zayn get to the fridge when he was hungry. 

They'd banded together by necessity at first, all three of them on the same Education course, but by reading week in the first term, they'd already decided to live together in second year. As the weeks went on, it had been harder and harder for Louis to tell them that his marriage had just broken down, and that his heart felt like it was in a million tiny pieces. It was easier just to keep it all a secret, and first year had turned into second year had turned into third year, and then all three of them had decided to stay on and do their PGCEs. Louis was going to be a drama teacher, Zayn English, and Niall music. After that first week, there hadn't ever been the right time to talk about why he was starting uni so late. He'd just let people think he'd worked through a gap year, and never went in to any more detail.

Louis pulled the sleeves of Liam's hoodie down over his hands, and crawled out of bed. Niall woke up as he stepped over him on the way to the loo, and caught Louis's ankle with his hand. 

"You all right?" 

Louis had refused to talk about Liam last night. After the crying jag on the hall floor, he'd clammed up and gone back to the telly; after _Avengers Assemble_ they'd moved on to _Iron Man_ and _Iron Man 2_. 

He swallowed. "No," he said. "But I'm fine. It's fine."

Niall sat up on his elbows. "You're a fucking liar, Lou. You can talk to me, you know."

Louis shrugged. "I'm going for a piss. Believe what you want, but I'm fine. I don't need to talk to anyone."

"I'll get up," Niall said, ignoring him. "Stick the kettle on when you're done, will you?"

Louis rolled his eyes, but didn't argue. Niall was dogged when he wanted to be, and in the end, Louis put the kettle on anyway and rested his cheek against the kitchen table whilst it boiled. 

"I proper fancied him the first time I saw him, you know. Liam," Louis said, as Niall got them both mugs out. He got a third out for Zayn, too, even though it was morning and there was no way Zayn was surfacing before noon, even for tea. "I'd never fancied anyone like I fancied him." 

Up until meeting Liam, it had all been a bit theoretical, his bisexual thing. Liam had plonked it firmly in the real world, and Louis had reacted by showing off, and trying to be the funniest person in the world just to win his heart. He'd been a total fucking dick. He'd put his number in Liam's phone, though, and texted him his email address, and Liam had gone all pink and embarrassed. Louis remembered thinking, _I could fall in love with you_. 

"You don't have to, you know," Niall told him. "Tell me, I mean. I want you to, but you don't have to."

Louis shrugged. Whatever. It didn't matter anymore anyway; it was all in the past. "He hated school and I hated school and I was always messing around and getting into trouble. He was boxing after school and he almost got suspended for hitting some dickhead who used to beat him up. I used to phone him up when I was walking home from school and we just used to talk until my battery ran out on my phone. And then, like, one Saturday I just thought, fuck it, and got on a coach and went to fucking Wolverhampton."

He'd kissed Liam pressed up against the wall by the newsagent's by the bus station, after an afternoon of wandering through Wolverhampton town centre and eating Gregg's sausage rolls, and Liam had kissed back too quickly for it to be something he hadn't thought about. 

Louis didn't tell Niall about how Liam's leg had slid in between his, and Louis had pressed down against him, even without realising. About how Liam admitted later that Louis had been his first kiss. About pulling away and running for the coach and making it by the skin of his teeth. He didn't tell Niall he'd texted his mum as the bus was pulling out, _mum I think I'm in love._

He didn't tell Niall about the first time he'd gone down on Liam, at Christmas when Liam had made the first trip up to Doncaster to meet Louis's family, blowing him in the dark in the bathroom when everyone else was asleep. Louis couldn't forget the way Liam's hands had tightened in his hair, holding him awkwardly and desperately, trying not to hurt Louis, choking down his whines as Louis blew him inexpertly. Spitting onto the bathroom tiles. Cleaning it up with loo roll later. The way Liam had looked afterwards, skin flushed, dick softening, still spit-wet. 

Staying up late to watch stupid Christmas films hand in hand on the sofa, and waiting until everyone had gone to bed to start snogging. 

Getting caught by his mum in the middle of the night with his hand down Liam's pyjama bottoms. 

Having sex for the first time in Liam's bedroom in Wolverhampton in February half term when his parents were at work. 

"I was so in love with him," Louis said, as Niall pushed the marge and the jam over towards him. "I loved him so much. Like, proper fucking obsessed. I thought getting married to him was the best thing I'd ever do."

Niall tucked his foot round Louis's under the table. "Sounds legit," he said. 

Louis shrugged, and pulled his piece of toast to pieces. "If you had to pick between a life with me in some shitty bedsit in Wolver-fucking-hampton and being a pop star, which one would you pick? He couldn't have both and he deserved the second one. He's the best fucking singer in the world, and I loved him so much, you have no idea. Sony told him no because I was waiting for him in reception, you know? He has no fucking idea that's what they told me. And I knew, okay? He didn't deserve to be stuck with me, he deserved someone a million times better. I just held him back. Everyone thought it. So I made sure he could have the better end of the deal, that's all."

"Louis," Niall said, softly. "Lou."

"Don't," Louis said. "Don't be sorry for me. It's fine, okay? I told him I didn't love him anymore and I didn't want to be with him, and then he moved out and I put in a late application for uni, and he came back to try and be friends and I couldn't bear to look him in the face, so I told him we couldn't be friends anymore. And now he's doing what he loves and people love him for it, and I made the right decision, all right? I did the right thing."

"Not for you, though."

Louis shrugged. "Do you want more tea? I'm making more tea."

"Louis—"

"Enough," Louis said. "I don't want to talk about it anymore. I'm making tea and then I'm going to the library."

He hated the fucking library, but this coursework wasn't going to start itself, and he couldn't fucking bear the idea of seeing Niall sorry for him for one more second. 

He'd done the right thing; he _had_. 

~*~

Louis's first impression of university had been endless concrete breezeblocked corridors and a self-catering flat which had definitely been built for austerity rather than any type of comfort whatsoever. The sofa looked like it was particularly uncomfortable. Someone had already blu-tacked a picture of Homer Simpson in his pants onto the kitchen door. 

"Well," Louis's mum had said, a trifle doubtfully, "I'm sure with a bit of love and affection you can make this look like home."

Louis wasn't sure, but then Louis wasn't sure of anything any more, other than that he had a close and personal relationship with a vodka bottle that he was trying to hide from his mum. Three months back living at home, and he was quite adept at hiding a lot of things. "It's fine," he said, and he'd spent so long pretending that everything was fine, and that there wasn't a hole inside of him where he'd used to feel things, that he couldn't quite remember what it was like not to have to try. 

She'd helped him unpack after that, busily folding his t-shirts up into the drawers in the corner of his room, and lining up his little pile of CDs on the shelf above the desk. His sisters had given him pictures of each of them to take away with him, each of them decorating their own frame. Lottie's was full of writing, her little squashed handwriting chronicling the pizzas they'd made and the films they'd acted out in the garden all around the edge of her photograph. Fizzy's was lots of hearts and footballs and ballet shoes and—inexplicably—a hairbrush. The twins had fingerpainted their frame, messy smudges of colour around pictures of them with face paint butterflies on their faces. He put them all on the shelf next to the CDs and tried not to imagine the pictures of Liam he'd put up if he could. 

When his mum left, she'd bundled him up into a very tight hug. "You're still my little Louis," she'd said, a little tearfully considering he'd already lived away from home for going on two years, and had gone and got himself married for part of that. "Be good, don't do anything where you might get hurt, and remember you're always, always worth it, okay?"

"Okay," he'd said, and he'd wanted to cry too, but he hadn't. 

He'd watched her car disappear down the road until the taillights blurred with the rest of the traffic on the road, and then he turned back around to go inside. 

~*~

The chances of every single one of his flatmates turning out to be a complete knob were pretty low, but, hell, it had been the worst year ever, so Louis couldn't be surprised by the way things panned out. He was hemmed in between Knobhead Dave (kept his toilet roll in his bedroom and only ate potato smiley faces) and Dickhead Clive (perpetually stoned, never shared his weed, once left a paper bag in the fridge that said _dead goldfish inside_ ), and when Knobhead Dave had asked him on that first night in halls to keep his music down because it was affecting his chakras, Louis had known things were only going to get worse.

He found Zayn outside the front entrance to their hall three days into their first term, smoking a cigarette in the pouring rain. 

"Are your flatmates crap too, or are you just really addicted?" Louis asked, trying not to look too much like he wanted to bum a cigarette.

"Two of them are having sex in the kitchen right this second," Zayn said. "Well, I've been out here five minutes."

"Probably finished, then," Louis said. 

Zayn nodded. "Yeah. Can't imagine Pete's built for stamina."

"Do you want to come over mine?" Louis said. "If I put music on Knobhead Dave bangs on the wall, so yesterday I left the same Coldplay song on repeat while I went to the Union."

"Sick," Zayn said. "Have you met Niall?"

And that had been that. 

~*~

"How could you have kept this so secret?" Zayn asked later. He was sprawled across Louis's bed with an unlit cigarette in his mouth. "I thought we could count on you to be indiscreet. I knew which teachers were shagging twenty-four hours into your last placement, and it wasn't even my school."

Louis shrugged. He'd felt sick for almost twenty-four hours. "Nothing to say."

"You've always got something to say," Niall said, coming in with his laptop and making Zayn budge over. "You've never not had anything to say."

"Not about Liam. Impossible to explain, anyway. It's not like he's out."

"Do you have any pictures, or anything? I can't believe you used to be married."

"I still am married," Louis said. He stood up and went over to the chest of drawers in the corner by the wardrobe. All of the drawers were open, clothes spilling out and onto the floor. On top of the drawers was a framed _What's the Story, Morning Glory_ album print. He took it off the drawers and turned it around, leaning it up against the wall. Sellotaped to the back was a foolscap green plastic envelope, the kind organised people kept their notes in or their bank statements. 

The only part of Louis's life that was even vaguely organised was his marriage paperwork. He ripped the envelope off the back of the picture frame, and chucked it at the bed. "There you go." 

"That's fucking James Bond levels of secrecy, that is," Niall said, making a grab for the envelope. 

"Nah. If it was James Bond I'd have hid it in the air vent or something." Louis sat down in his office chair and shoved his hands into the pocket of his hoodie. Well, Liam's hoodie. He wasn't taking it off. If everything he'd locked away and tried so hard not to feel was being forced to the surface again, at least he was going to have his breakdown in his favourite hoodie. 

"Can we look?" Zayn asked. 

Louis shrugged. "Go on."

It hurt, watching them unpack the envelope onto the sheets. The marriage certificate, the battered, used envelope with their cheap rings in, the piece of paper he and Liam had doodled all over, endless scribblings of _mr and mr tomlinson_ and _mr and mr payne,_ and _Louis Tomlinson-Payne_ and _Liam Tomlinson-Payne_ and MARRIEDpicked out in jagged biro capitals. The _I love you_ in Liam's handwriting in the corner of the page. 

They'd just been fucking kids. Naïve, stupid, headstrong kids. Their marriage had been a mistake from beginning to end. The rest of it was boxed up in Louis's mum's attic, but this was the stuff he couldn't leave behind, even if he wanted to. His masochism wouldn't let him. Neither would the hole in his chest where his heart used to be.

The rubbish shopping list that Liam had written, scrunched up and unscrunched again, _Lynx Africa cos its Louiss favourite_ and _cereal_ and _stuff for dinner for Louis_ and it was stupid to keep that, _stupid_ , but Louis hadn't ever been able to throw it out. 

He watched them spread out the pictures across the duvet. Him and Liam, the first day they'd met in Derby, a grainy, poor quality picture on his phone camera he'd got printed out because he was that much of a loser. The stranger who'd been their witness, and who had taken six or seven pictures of them on their disposable camera at the town hall after they got married, the two of them beaming so hard at each other that Liam's eyes were all scrunched up and his smile so bright it still hurt Louis to look at it. Some others from that same disposable camera of them eating bacon sandwiches in bed, and then later on, when they ate their Marks and Spencer dine in for two meal and drank fizzy pink champagne out of mugs. A couple from Christmas, and a couple of ones he'd stolen from Liam's photo albums when he'd left him, the kind he couldn't let Liam keep. The ones where Louis looked so much in love it would have been impossible to pretend that he didn't feel like that anymore. 

They'd been so young. Louis felt like he'd aged a hundred years at uni. 

"I didn't know he had such curly hair," Zayn said, after a minute where none of them said anything. The two of them kept looking at the pictures. Louis didn't dare move closer. He was only keeping himself together through sheer, desperate will. Zayn held up the picture of Liam and Louis, that first day they'd met. "He looks so young. You both do."

"Don't," Louis said, and to his horror he sounded like he was going to cry. "Please don't."

Niall looked at him, then started shovelling the stuff into Louis's envelope again. Zayn came over and wrapped his arms around Louis's shoulders; Louis stood as rigid as he could, desperate not to give in to it again. He and Liam were in the past, dead and buried, and he needed to move on. Liam wasn't coming back and there was no future for the two of them. There was just this, this life he'd created for himself with Niall and Zayn, this future he was working on so that he would be more than the loser kid who'd married a pop star. 

"It's all right," he said finally. His chest felt hollow. "You don't have to be careful with me. It just brought it all back, that's all. It's all right."

"Do you want to go out and get food?" Niall asked, rubbing his back. "Get out of here. We could go to Nando's."

Louis shrugged. "All right." He had nothing better to do with his time. He'd learned from bitter experience that if he was left to his own devices, he'd lose himself in a vodka bottle, and that might have seemed like a good coping mechanism when he was a first year, but maybe there were different ones now. Maybe he'd eat first, and then drown himself in vodka later. 

Character growth, that. 

"Change your clothes though," Niall said. "You've slept in that hoodie for two days."

Liam's hoodie. The last piece he had left of him. Louis looked down at the floor. "Fine," he said. "Suppose you want me to shower, too?"

"Might be nice," Zayn said. "Not saying your aroma of broken heart is anything less than beautiful, mind."

"It's not been that long," Louis grumbled, but maybe a shower might be nice. 

The only way out was through. He'd learnt that, through three years and seven months of hard work and dedication. The only way out of any of this was through sheer bloody-mindedness, and an awful lot of pretending he was okay. 

It wasn't like he wasn't well practiced at it. 

~*~

It tipped it down on the way back from Nando's. It was freezing cold, even on the bus, and water ran down the insides of the windows because apparently the little rain cloud that was shitting on Louis's life travelled by public transport too. 

The tiger who lived inside Louis's head was wearing a kagoul and a rain hat, but as it hadn't exactly done a bang up job of protecting Louis's secrets from the world, Louis was ignoring it in favour of staring out the window at nothing, and nodding every now and again as Niall and Zayn tried to engage him in conversation. 

It was tiring, was the thing. Dealing with shit. Telling the truth. 

"Let's just go home and have a drink, all right?" he said, as the bus pulled up at their stop. Obviously, because of the magic of forethought and not bothering to listen to the weather forecast, none of them had umbrellas, although at least Zayn's jacket had a hood. "Let's get the vodka out."

Zayn slung an arm around his shoulders, and kissed his forehead. "Okay."

They got off the bus and ran down the road in the rain, water sluicing down the back of Louis's neck. All three of them were soaked through in seconds, the rain bouncing off the pavements. Louis's jeans were soaked, and his Vans squelched. 

"Vodka," Niall yelled as they rounded the final corner, his arm in the air. Louis skidded into a puddle as they raced the last few steps back to the house, exhilarated even though he was soaked through. 

Liam Payne shivering and soaking wet on their doorstep sort of put the knackers on that, though. 

"Hi," Louis said, coming to an abrupt arboreal stop, one arm around the shitty, wonky tree that got in the way of their front gate. You're here."

"Hi," Liam said, through chattering teeth. "You weren't here."

"No," Louis said, unable to consider doing anything sensible like moving. He stayed hugging the tree. Wetly. "Shouldn't you have a minion holding an umbrella?"

"No minions," Liam said, still shivering. He was absolutely soaked. Louis had seen him drier getting out of the shower. 

Honestly, that fucking tiger was doing a shit job of keeping all of those memories locked away. 

"I'd have a minion," Louis said, trying to ignore the frantic pounding of his heart. God, Liam Payne. He'd tried and he'd tried, but he was going to fucking love him until the day he fucking died, and there was nothing anyone could do about that. It was just there, as familiar as breathing, this space in his chest that belonged to Liam as constant and unerring as the space that belonged to his mum and his family. "I'd have a million fucking minions."

"For fuck's sake," Zayn said, pushing past Louis and stopping in front of Liam. "Do you want to come inside?"

Liam glanced at Louis. "If it's okay."

"Well, the alternative is you staying out here and drowning to death," Louis said, since his brain apparently wasn't connected to his mouth anymore. "How long have you been here, anyway?"

Zayn was trying to get his key to turn in the Yale. It had been stiff for a while. It was the kind of task Liam liked to take on, small but useful. 

Louis's heart ached. 

"About an hour," Liam said, as Niall stepped back to let Liam inside after Zayn. Louis followed them in last, and they all stood in the hall and dripped. 

"Well," Niall said. "Tea?"

"I'll put the kettle on," Zayn said, already stripping out of his wet coat. Niall followed him into the kitchen, and then it was just Liam and Louis in the hall. 

Liam was soaking wet. He was sopping, his jacket dark with rain. He was shivering. Rain was literally running down his face.

"You're soaked," Louis said. Louis was wet, but Liam was a walking, talking river.

"Yeah." 

"I meant it about a minion and an umbrella, by the way. Why didn't you wait in the car? You dimwit."

"Walked here," Liam said. "No minions."

"You should have minions," Louis said, automatically. Liam's teeth started to chatter. "Fuck, you're freezing. You could shower, or something. Warm up."

"I'd only have to put my wet clothes back on."

"You could borrow something." 

"You've already got one of my hoodies."

"No," Louis said immediately. "You're not having that. It's mine. You're not walking off with it." That hoodie meant a lot to him. It meant Liam to him, and he'd given Liam up, and he was fucking keeping that fucking hoodie, if only so he could sleep in it until his heart stopped hurting. "I've got other stuff." He raised his voice. "Do we have any clean towels?"

Niall stuck his head round the kitchen door, far too quickly for someone who hadn't been listening in. He looked distinctly unimpressed. "You might not," he said, "but I've got a spare set."

"You don't need a spare," Louis said dismissively. "Towels get wet all the time. You dry them and you use them again. What's the point of a spare set?"

"You're revolting," Niall said. "They're in my wardrobe."

"Can I use them?" Liam asked. "I'll arrange for them to be cleaned."

"No need, mate," Niall said. "We've got a washing machine. Just use them. Did you want tea?"

Liam nodded, but Louis was already half way up the stairs, pushing open the door to Niall's bedroom, and coming back out again with a clean towel. He got some tracksuit bottoms out of his wardrobe, and his oversized green hoodie, and then he dumped them into Liam's damp, waiting arms. 

"Here," Louis said, already kicking open the bathroom door. "Shower's a bit shit, stick the hot all the way on and faff around with the cold so you don't burn to death. Use whatever you want from in the bathroom. I do."

"Oi," Zayn yelled from downstairs. "I knew you were using my shower gel."

"Lies," Louis yelled back. He turned his attention back to Liam, but tried not to focus on his face. He looked at Liam's shoulder instead. "Are you hungry? I could make you a sandwich. We've been to Nando's, so we've eaten."

"What kind of sandwich?"

Louis shrugged. "Jam?"

They'd lived off jam sandwiches for a while. It reminded Louis of being poor and in love. 

"What kind of jam?"

"Strawberry," Louis said. "The only kind."

"Then, yes."

When he got downstairs, he put his face in his hands, just for a moment, and breathed. 

~*~

"You can't make Liam Payne a jam sandwich," Niall said in horror, five minutes later. "He's a pop star."

Louis slathered strawberry jam onto two slightly stale pieces of bread. He'd grabbed them from the bottom of the bag, in the vain hope that that meant they were fresher. He squished the sandwich together, and then cut the crusts off, because Liam didn't like crusts. "He's getting a jam sandwich," Louis said, because the alternative was imagining Liam naked in Louis's shower, and that definitely couldn't be the focus of Louis's attention, because he might collapse under the weight of everything he wanted and couldn't have. 

"What's he doing here?" Zayn asked, nudging two mugs of tea down the counter towards Louis. 

"Literally no idea," Louis said. "But if he's here to yell at me again, at least he won't be wet through and ravenous as he does it." He cut the jam sandwich into two, and put it on a plate. 

"Louis—"

"Really, really don't." He hadn't got anything to say. There wasn't anything to say. There was just Liam, his husband, here in his house. 

He took the sandwich and two cups of tea upstairs, got changed out of his wet clothes, and waited for Liam to get out of the shower. 

~*~

Liam appeared awkwardly in his bedroom doorway a few minutes later, dressed in Louis's clothes and with his hair wet. "Where do you want this?" he asked, waving the towel in Louis's direction. 

Louis was sitting on his bed with his knees drawn up to his chest, messing with his phone. He locked it and dropped it on the duvet next to him. "There's fine," he said, indicating the floor. Liam looked all soft in Louis's clothes. It wasn't fair. Seeing him like this was familiar, but so much more grown up. Everything about him was more defined. He probably wouldn't feel the same if Louis touched him. 

"Where's your washing pile?"

Louis rolled his eyes, and pointed at a heap by the side of the fireplace. It was the nice thing about living in an old terrace: there might be a terrible draft in through the badly fitting windows, but all the bedrooms had little fireplaces in. Louis used his blocked up grate to keep his football in, and some empty bottles of Jack Daniels and beer. 

Liam dropped the towel on top of the pile. There were a couple of pictures of Louis's family propped up on the mantelpiece, in between half empty boxes of Marlboro and bits of crap that didn't have a home. "They've got so big," Liam said, pointing at the twins. 

"Yeah," Louis said. They'd grown up. That happened.

Liam picked up the photo that was propped up against the empty bottle of Jim Beam. It was the picture of Liam and Louis from the first day they'd met, grainy and poor quality. Louis hadn't been able to put it away earlier. Liam looked at it for a long time, and didn't say anything. 

Louis's heart pounded. 

"I thought you were the best thing to ever happen to me," Liam said finally. "Even then. I couldn't believe anyone like you would ever even notice me."

"Couldn't look away," Louis said, after a minute. "I never could."

Liam put the picture back on the mantelpiece. He looked around the room. Louis couldn't help but look too, at the posters peeling off the wall, and the clothes all over the floor, and the desk full of papers and notes and half finished cups of tea. There were two DVDs perched on top of the crap on his desk, and Liam went straight for them. 

" _Red Dwarf_?"

"Found them in the pound shop," Louis said. "Like, last week."

" _Red Dwarf_? In the pound shop?"

"Poundland," Louis said. "You probably send your minions in there for you."

Liam put the DVDs back down on the desk. "No minions." He paused. "Sorry for just showing up on your doorstep, by the way."

"Why did you come, anyway? I thought you'd never want to see me again." Louis nudged the plate across the bed. "I made you a sandwich."

Liam came and sat down on the edge of the bed. "You don't want half?"

He shook his head. "Ate all the chicken Nando's had. It's just for you."

"I wanted to talk to you. Get some things straight in my head."

"Like what?" Louis couldn't talk about any of this stuff. He'd hidden it away for so long, locked it up in his head behind his imaginary tiger's watchful eye, and it hurt so much. There had been a hole in his chest that he'd tried to cover up and ignore and move on from for almost four years, and it had never properly worked. He'd hidden it for so long that he had no idea how to deal with it now it was out in the open. It had never been out in the open. Not with anyone. 

"You didn't stop loving me," Liam said, holding his sandwich in his hand but not taking a bite. "All this time I thought you stopped loving me."

"No." 

"You just pretended," Liam said. "Did you tell anyone the truth?"

He shook his head again. "My secret."

Liam just looked sad. "Lou—"

"Eat your sandwich. You were outside getting wet for ages. You'll get the flu and die."

"Jam will save me, or something?"

"Something," Louis said. 

Liam made an attempt at eating half of it, at least. Louis dug his toes into the duvet, and picked at the threadbare knee of his jeans. 

"What did you do after we split up?" Liam asked finally. 

Louis looked up from his lap and shrugged. "Drank a lot."

"Louis. I mean, really. What did you do?"

"No, really. I drank vodka for three months, and cried all over my mum a lot, and applied for here."

"God."

"It's all right. I never would of—" Louis stopped. "I was never going to amount to anything, and now look at me. In September I'll be an actual teacher. Me."

Liam looked impossibly sad. 

The vodka story wasn't that shocking, was it? He'd pushed his husband away, he'd given him up, surely that necessitated a bit of alcohol-fuelled self-loathing. 

"Do you really think I thought you weren't going to amount to anything? Fuck, Louis. I thought you were something from the very first time I ever saw you. And I always knew you'd do anything to look after me. To protect me."

Louis couldn't look at him. "Shut up."

"And you did, didn't you? That's what I've been thinking about. You did the one thing you were one hundred per cent sure was looking after me properly."

Louis was staring fixedly into the side of his wardrobe. He sniffed. His breath felt all caught up in his chest, like he was going to explode from the pressure. "I was looking after you," he said. "I was."

"I know," Liam said. "I didn't know that, but I do now. I kept Harry up for hours last night going over and over it. And, like, I just—" he stopped. "You thought you were looking after me. That's what you thought you were doing."

"They weren't signing you because of me. Because you were married to me. And then they signed you, because you didn't have me. I did the right thing." He couldn't believe differently. He couldn't. He clenched his fists in the sheets. 

"Thing is," Liam said, like Louis hadn't spoken. "I wanted to be with you. That's why I married you. So I could look after you like you looked after me. I thought you were brilliant. I thought someone needed to tell you that every day forever."

"You wanted to be a singer. That's all you ever wanted."

"I wanted to sing, and have my family, and be married to you. That's what I wanted. Those three things."

Louis wiped his nose on the back of his hand. His eyes stung from trying so desperately not to cry. 

"You didn't let me pick what I wanted," Liam said softly, "and you broke my heart. You shouldn't have done that."

"I thought you'd get over me," Louis said finally. His voice shook. "I didn't think you'd be so hurt. I didn't know I'd never be able to get over you."

Liam's voice cracked, and he reached his hand out. "Lou—"

Louis shifted out of Liam's grasp. "You know how I know that I did the right thing? Because you're a huge pop star, and you've just sold out an arena tour, and you haven't told a single one of your fans you're bi." A tear escaped. He hurriedly wiped it away. "I kept checking to see if you had. I've seen your Instagram pictures of your dog a million times. And your friends. And you're still not bi. I'd go back to see and you'd still be straight, and it's how I knew. It's how I know. You're famous, and there's not a space in your life for someone like me. There isn't now and there wasn't then. Because I might still love you but it's all fucking right, because I did the right thing, and you've got your dream."

"You did something really, really brave," Liam said after a minute. He didn't seem like he was in complete control either. "Harry said it was, like, noble and self-sacrificing. But it's the most unfair thing you'd ever done."

"No," Louis said. 

"You broke my heart," Liam went on, "but you broke yours too. And mine is okay, in a way, because I might still love you, but at least I got to be broken-hearted. I bored everyone rigid going on and on about you, but I got to deal with it. You never told anyone."

"It hurt," Louis said, and it felt like he was tearing himself open, unlocking doors he'd barricaded shut and set an imaginary tiger to guard, everything breaking open like a dam splitting into pieces. "It hurts so much."

"I know," Liam said softly. "You were so brave, weren't you? So brave."

Louis didn't mean to cry, but he couldn't help himself. "Don't," he said. "Please don't."

"Don't cry," Liam said, and he pushed his sandwich away and reached over to cover Louis's hand with his own. "Please don't cry."

"I'm sorry," Louis said. "I'm so sorry."

"You were so brave," Liam said again, but this time he was moving closer, and reaching for Louis, and Louis so desperately wanted to pull away, but he couldn't. He'd tried so hard for so long to be brave and he couldn't do it anymore. There was nothing left inside to keep him strong. 

"Liam—" his voice cracked. "Please."

"Babe," Liam said, and everything inside of Louis felt like it was splitting apart, and he couldn't control any of it. Liam wrapped his arms around Louis's shoulders, and Louis tipped forward, hiding his face in Liam's shoulder as he gave in to it and sobbed. "It's all right. It's not a secret anymore. You don't have to do this by yourself."

And Louis couldn't, he just couldn't. He'd been alone for so long. He'd loved Liam for so long. 

Liam curled his fingers into Louis's hair, and held Louis as he cried. He didn't pull away, even when it turned out that Louis couldn't stop. He kept on rubbing Louis's back, and stroking his fingers through Louis's hair, even as Louis cried messily into his shoulder. 

"I wanted to say thank you," Liam said after a while, when Louis had stopped crying his eyes out and settled for basic, horrifically embarrassing sobs instead. "That's what I came round for. To say thank you. For what you did. For what you gave up."

Louis pulled away, and dug the heels of his hands into his eyes to stop himself from crying some more. They felt swollen and gritty. "You got signed," he said finally, once he got himself under control. It took a couple of minutes. His voice sounded croaky. Too much crying. How humiliating. "You got a chance. That's all I wanted."

"Yeah," Liam said. "You helped me do that."

"I knew you'd make it," Louis said. "I always fucking knew you could do it. I knew you were worth so much more than being stuck with me."

Liam shook his head, reaching for him again. "It wasn't like that. I wasn't ever stuck with you. Not ever."

"But you wouldn't have got signed. They didn't want a gay teenager with a husband. Sorry. Bisexual."

"They might have done," Liam said. "We didn't give it a chance."

Louis hadn't ever mentioned the guy from Sony. He knew Liam had always assumed the rejection had meant he wasn't good enough, when that hadn't been the case at all. Louis had made him not good enough. 

"No," Louis said. "We gave it a chance. Then I gave you more of a chance. They couldn't turn you down. Not when you sound like you do."

Liam looked down at his lap. "You believe in me more than anyone else. More than my dad, and he's, like, the proudest dad in the world. He's prouder of me than that dad at the Olympics. What did I ever do to deserve that from either of you?"

Louis didn't know what to say to that. "I loved you," he said finally. "I loved you so much. I just wanted you to be, like, successful. I wanted everyone to know how great you were. I don't know why it's so hard to understand that. Your dad wanted that too."

"I just—" Liam stopped. "I don't get why you'd ever want me to be successful more than you'd want you to be happy."

Louis looked down at his lap. "I was so fucking stupid over you. It just—it always seemed so romantic. Like, I asked you to marry me when we were eating chips in bed. I knew I wanted to marry you. I knew I wanted to be with you forever. And you said yes. I don't think I've ever been that happy again, you know. Not even when we actually got married."

"Why did you change your mind?" Liam looked so unhappy. "What made you think you didn't want forever anymore? I loved you."

"I know I'm a stupid fucking romantic, all right? I knew I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you. I wanted us to be an adventure. The best fucking adventure in the world. That's what I thought we were doing. But it turns out I thought eating chips in bed was an adventure, and it would have been your only one. Chips in bed, married to me. That's no life."

"God, Louis."

"You've been abroad and you're doing arenas and everything. That's like adventure after adventure after adventure."

"What about your adventures, though?" Liam asked. He sounded like he might cry. 

Louis made a face. "Think my geography teacher had it about right. I wasn't ever going to amount to anything."

"Except now. You're years more qualified than me, now. Clever clogs."

Louis smiled. It felt sad. "Took me long enough."

"You did the wrong thing," Liam said finally, and Louis's chest hurt. "You were the adventure I picked. You made a huge sacrifice and I'll never not appreciate that, but I love you. I'm married to you. I wanted to be married to you. You took that away without asking me what I wanted."

"God. Can we just—" Louis let out a ragged breath. "Do you want another cup of tea? This one's gone cold."

"Lou."

"We could watch a DVD after, if you want. Stick _Red Dwarf_ on or something."

"You were my family," Liam said. "I chose you."

Louis blinked away tears again. "I chose what was best for you. Can we have five minutes not talking about it? Please." He reached for his mug. "Come on, do you want tea or what?" 

Liam looked at him for a long minute. "All right," he said. "Do you want a hand making it?"

Louis stood up, and gathered up their mugs. Liam was already picking up his empty jam sandwich plate. "All right."

Downstairs, Liam awkwardly washed his plate up whilst Louis waited for the kettle to boil. He wrapped his arms around himself and stared down at his toes. His feet were cold. He couldn't consider the option that meant he'd made the wrong choice. He'd given up so much, and he'd hidden his hurt for so long, and he'd done it so that Liam could do what he loved, and have people appreciate him for it. Because Liam deserved appreciation. He deserved to have people like him, and value how hard he'd always worked. He'd been miserable at school, and underappreciated, and Louis had just wanted to make Liam successful. It had never crossed his mind that Liam wouldn't make it in some capacity, because Liam had the kind of voice that made Louis's fingers tingle. He hugged himself a little harder, miserable and shaken up. There was no way on earth that what Liam had achieved wasn't better than what he'd had with Louis, even if it had been the whole of Louis's world.

"Hey," Liam said softly, drying his hands on the tea towel. "Hey, Lou."

Louis looked up. His eyes were wet again. He couldn't help it. 

"Come here," Liam said, and he opened his arms. Louis leaned into him, rubbing his cheek against Liam's hoodie. 

"Sorry," Louis said again, after a while. "I never wanted you to get hurt."

"I know," Liam said. "But I never wanted you to be alone."

"I'm not alone," Louis said. He had Niall and Zayn, and his family. He had his friends. He didn't have a husband, but then neither did most of the people he knew. He had the beginnings of his career. He had his degree. He had a future. 

He just didn't have Liam. 

Liam wrapped his arms around Louis's shoulders, and kissed the top of his head. It had been so, so long since Louis had been kissed like that. He let himself stay there, in Liam's arms, until the kettle had finished boiling, and it was time to make the tea. 

He made tea for all four of them, and carried the mugs upstairs on a tray. "We're watching _Red Dwarf_ ," he yelled, "come and watch it with us. I've made tea."

Zayn stuck his head round his bedroom door. "Which series?"

"Doesn't matter," Louis said, and he knew he looked like he'd been crying, but other than a tiny furrow between Zayn's brows, he didn't say anything about it. "Come and watch it anyway."

"Fine," Zayn said. "Niall, come on. _Red Dwarf_."

"Which series?" Niall asked, coming out of the bathroom in a loosely tied stripy dressing gown and with his hair in a towel turban. 

"I asked that," Zayn said. "He wouldn't say."

Louis rolled his eyes. "Five. Put some clothes on, Niall, no one wants an accidental cock view. We've got guests."

"I am hung like a horse," Niall said, but he tied his dressing gown a little tighter anyway.

"Yeah, a Shetland pony," Zayn said, wrapping a scarf round his neck. Their house was freezing. "Give me my tea, come on." He glanced past Louis to Liam. "You look drier."

"I am," Liam agreed. "Thanks for the towel, Niall."

"No worries," Niall said, going into his bedroom. "Put the DVD on, but don't press play. I'll only be a minute."

"Fine," Louis said, going into his bedroom. "Zayn, bring your little radiator, will you? It's cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey in my room."

"How cold do you think it has to be to, you know, off a brass monkey?" Liam asked. He went over to the window in Louis's room to close the curtains. 

"No idea," Louis said. "Cold, though." He angled his little TV round a bit and put the disc in his battered old DVD player. He left Niall and Zayn's tea on the desk and went back over to the bed with his and Liam's tea, putting them down on the bedside table whilst he made an attempt at plumping up his pillows. He couldn't look back at Liam. His heart pounded. For so long Liam had been his best friend and his boyfriend, and then his husband, and for the past few years he'd been Louis's secret, living inside his head under the guardianship of an imaginary tiger. He didn't know how to deal with a living, real life Liam Payne, especially when a living, real life Liam Payne was making him feel a whole lot of things he didn't want to be feeling. 

Louis plonked himself down in the middle of the bed, and then frowned at Liam. "Are you sitting down, or what?" His hand trembled, and he stopped it by clenching it in the duvet. 

Liam's expression was a little weird, but he schooled it into something a little plainer. "All right," he said, and sat down on the bed next to Louis. Their knees bumped together, but neither of them pulled away. 

On the TV, the BBC warnings started to flash up on the screen, and then the _Red Dwarf_ menu started to play. Zayn pushed open the door with his office chair, the little radiator perched on it like a particularly resplendent royal radiator, draped in a purple fleecy blanket. They were used to being cold. After Zayn, Niall followed, towelling his hair dry and in his pyjamas and a dressing gown, holding a pillow. 

"I'm having your chair," Niall said to Louis, with a glance at Liam. He clambered over the end of the bed and sprawled out on Louis's chair. "And I'm changing the settings. Don't give me that look; we had to get rid of the yucca when you threw up on it, the least you can do is let me fuck with your chair."

"Fine," Louis said, and he shifted a little, so that his thigh brushed Liam's. "Do shit to my chair, I don't care."

"Good," Niall said, pulling over one of the empty plastic boxes Louis hadn't quite unpacked from the summer. He put his pillow on it and hoiked his leg up onto it, like a footrest. 

"How's your knee?" Louis asked, and he tried not to notice as Liam's little finger touched his. His hand jerked, just a little. 

"Must have fucked it up on the way back from Nando's," Niall said. "I've taken a Diclofenac."

"Niall." Zayn leaned over. "Why didn't you say?"

"My own fault," Niall said. "Come on, stick the DVD on. We haven't got all day. I've got all that coursework to start tomorrow."

"Me too." Zayn sounded gloomy. "Have you started yours yet, Lou?"

"Yeah. I'll do more of it tomorrow," Louis said, reaching for the remote. His hand properly bumped into Liam's. He pressed play, and tried to find a place on the duvet for his hand as the titles started. There wasn't anywhere. There was just Liam, everywhere, here with him. His hand hovered over the bed.

Liam slid his hand into Louis's and squeezed. 

Louis trembled, and stared fixedly at the TV. He didn't pull away. 

_Holoship_ was a bad episode to start with, as it began with the crew all crying over some film where the guy sacrificed himself to save a girl, and Rimmer saying that no man would ever do that. 

"We could skip to the next one," Zayn said, a little hesitantly. 

Louis's hand was sweating, or was that Liam's?

"It's fine," he said. "Don't worry."

It wasn't fine. Liam was holding his hand. Liam was holding his hand, and Louis was still in love with him, and he'd tried moving on, and he'd tried not thinking about it, and he'd tried seeing other people, and he'd tried burying himself in his degree, and nothing had worked. Nothing had made it go away. He loved him, and he was going to get hurt. 

One episode turned into a second episode, turned into a third episode. Mr Flibble turned up, and Louis—focused only on the television, and not on his hot hand in Liam's—refused to look as Liam shifted on the sheets next to him, resting his head against Louis's shoulder. They'd both slid down the bed a little as the episodes had progressed. 

At the end of the fourth episode, Zayn put his hands in the air and yawned. "That's me done," he said, reaching for the pause button on the DVD. "Do you want me to pause it?"

Louis didn't know what he wanted. Zayn paused it anyway. 

Niall clambered awkwardly to his feet, stretching. "Oh," he said. "Liam's asleep."

Louis let himself look then. Liam was asleep on his shoulder, mouth slightly open. 

His heart hurt. 

"Are you going to wake him up?" Niall asked. 

There was a long, long moment where Louis didn't say anything. "No," he said finally. "He can stay here."

Zayn looked like he thought that was a bad idea. "You're going to get hurt," he said. "I don't want you to get hurt."

Louis laughed at that. He tried not to jostle Liam. "I already am," he said softly. "It's already started."

"Lou—"

"Let me have this one night, all right?" He didn't mean to sound like he was pleading. "Just this once, let me have him back. I know he's not staying. I know it's the end."

They both looked desperately sad. Louis tried not to show it echoed on his own face. 

"Pass me the blanket, will you?" The duvet was all rucked up at the bottom of the bed. Louis couldn't reach for it without shifting Liam, and now it came to it, he really didn't want to make Liam move. 

Zayn dutifully got a hold of the duvet, and Niall the other corner, and then they made a big deal of tucking Louis in. Niall leaned in and kissed Louis's forehead. 

"Be careful," Niall said quietly.

Louis nodded, but it wasn't enough to make him stop. 

"Night," Zayn said, and Niall turned off the light as he left, pulling the door closed behind them. 

Louis was in bed with his husband, and he was going to get hurt. He was going to get so, so hurt. He closed his eyes. His heart was pounding so loud Liam could probably hear it. 

"I don't want you to get hurt," Liam said softly. "I don't ever want you to be hurt."

"You were asleep," Louis said, without moving. He opened his eyes again. His heart thumped. 

"I was before." Liam shifted a little, so that he was on his side, and his breath was warm against Louis's throat. "But now I'm awake."

"I missed you so much," Louis blurted, before he could help himself. "I missed you. I'm so sorry."

Liam slowly, carefully stroked his fingers through Louis's hair. "Your hair's got so long." 

Louis shook with it. "I'm lazy. Can't ever be bothered to go and get a haircut."

"Don't put yourself down all the time," Liam said, still touching Louis's temple. "You're not lazy."

"Don't be nice to me," Louis said. "It's okay. You don't have to be. I know you're angry with me."

"I don't want to be," Liam told him. "I don't even know if I am anymore. I'm all mixed up. I just know my life was always more fun when you were in it, causing trouble. You made my life better."

Louis tried to smile, but he couldn't. He rolled onto his side instead, so he was facing Liam. It was dark in his bedroom, the light from the streetlight outside mostly filtered out by his thick curtains. "I wanted so much to do the right thing. I thought I was. I thought I was giving you something you wanted more than anything."

"I didn't want it at that price. If the price was you, I didn't want it."

"Would you give it all up, though? Being famous and being able to sing and everything? I just—I don't think you would."

"I don't have to, though. We're not there anymore. We're here."

Louis let out a breath, and buried his face in Liam's shoulder. "I don't know what to do. I was doing all right before I saw you again. I'd hidden it all away. I was coping."

"Do you wish you hadn't seen me?"

Louis shook his head. He was still hiding his face. "No. My life's better when you're in it, too." His voice caught again. "God, Liam. I've loved you for so fucking long."

This time it was Liam's voice that caught. "Can I kiss you? I just—I really want to kiss you." Louis wanted to say yes more than anything in the world. "I still love you," he said, and his voice caught. "I don't know whether—I don't know why I'm telling you. It doesn't change anything. But I do." 

"I wish I could make it so that you never got hurt."

"Liam—"

"I miss you," Liam said. "I don't think I've ever stopped. I just want to kiss you again. Please, Lou."

Louis closed his eyes. He balled up all of his courage and reached out and stroked his arm down Liam's bicep. "Me too. It could just be—" he stopped. "It'll be one night. No strings. I won't get hurt."

There was a long pause. "I might, though."

"Liam—" Louis said again.

Liam stroked his fingers through Louis's hair. His hand was trembling. "I don't know what's going on between us," he said. "I don't want it to just be one night. I want to be, like—god. We've got all this history, and all of this stuff, and we've never talked about any of it, and I want us to. Because we deserve that, at least. Don't we? Like, you need to talk about it with someone. You never got that. And half the time I know I should still be really mad at you, and the other half I'm in love with you, and all the time I love you, because you were my best friend, and I told myself and told myself it wasn't your fault that you didn't love me anymore. And you don't stop loving family."

"Liam."

Liam kept touching him, his fingers stroking. "You don't stop loving family," he said again, and he kissed Louis's temple. "And you're my family."

"I left you," Louis said, and he could feel the tears start. "You were my husband and I left you, and I've done all this stuff without you, and most of it's been great, but there's a space, and it was always you-shaped."

"Same," Liam said. "Fuck, Louis, you should see what it looks like on stage when everyone's out there, and they're there to see me. It feels like flying. I'm so, so lucky, and I've done so well, but I wish I could have done it with you. I've got the best fans ever, but I wish I was going home to you afterwards."

"You didn't come to my graduation," Louis said. "But I got a 2:1. Me."

"I always believed you were brilliant."

And the thing was, Liam always had. Louis had known right from the beginning that he wasn't, but Liam hadn't ever thought that was true. Liam had always believed in him. "I amounted to something," he said, and most of the time he believed that. "And I'm going to amount to more, too. I'm going to prove him wrong. I'm going to be a teacher and I'm going to be better than he ever was." He didn't need to say he was talking about his old geography teacher. Liam always knew. 

"I always knew you would, you know."

"Maybe I wouldn't have, if the two of us had stayed together. Maybe I wouldn't have gone to uni. Maybe you wouldn't have sung."

Liam let out a ragged breath. "We weren't perfect. Nobody is."

"We used to have those stupid arguments."

"I know. I still loved you even when we were arguing. Do you graduate from this course? Your teacher training one?"

Louis nodded. "Well. If I pass." 

"I could come to this graduation," Liam said tentatively. "If you wanted me to."

Louis closed his eyes for a moment, then leaned in and cupped Liam's face in his hands. 

"Louis—"

"Shush," Louis said softly, and kissed him. He kissed him gently, a little breathlessly, his hands warm as he stroked his thumbs over Liam's cheeks. Liam's hands came up to meet his, to wrap around Louis's wrists as he kissed Louis back, his fingertips over the trembling pulse of Louis's heartbeat beneath his skin, a quivering _SOS_ that Louis desperately didn't want him to be able to read. 

"Louis," Liam said, his mouth a hair's breadth from Louis's. "God. My Louis."

Louis couldn't cry again. He couldn't. He just hadn't expected it to hurt so much. "I don't think I can do this," he said, even though not kissing Liam again was killing him. "You'll leave and I don't know if I can do it a second time. Watch you leave."

Liam slid his hands into Louis's hair and pulled him closer. "Me neither," he said. "Me fucking neither."

Louis squeezed his eyes shut, and hid his face in Liam's hoodie. "Please don't go. Don't go yet."

Liam shook his head. "I promise," he said, and he kissed the top of Louis's head. "I swear. I'll still be here in the morning."

Louis had no fucking idea what he was doing. Trying desperately to look after himself, maybe. Trying to protect himself. "Do you want pyjamas?" he asked. "You'll be hot, in all that."

"Okay," Liam said, and Louis switched the lamp on and went over to his drawers, getting out some too-big basketball shorts and a t-shirt for Liam, and some pyjama bottoms and a faded old t-shirt for himself. 

He tried not to watch as Liam got undressed, but he couldn't help it. Liam was bigger, and more defined than he had been the last time they'd been together. And Liam kept looking over his shoulder too, at Louis getting changed. 

"You've got tattoos," Liam said. "What does that one say?"

"It is what it is," Louis said. "I dunno. I got bored of trying to change stuff. I needed to be okay with how things were. And I am. Mostly." He paused. "Tonight excepted. Maybe this week excepted."

Liam nodded. He pulled up his shorts. "I think we need to talk about a million things," he said, getting back into bed. "I think you need to just, I don't know, talk about it full stop."

"Maybe." Louis made a face. "I'm going for a wee. Back in a minute."

When he got back, Liam had made the bed and organised the pillows, and Louis couldn't help but roll his eyes. 

"Five seconds alone and you're tidying up."

"Only a little bit." He pulled back the covers. "What are you up to for the rest of the week?"

"Coursework, mostly," Louis said, climbing awkwardly into bed. His foot brushed Liam's under the covers, and he didn't move away. "It's always fucking coursework. It's supposed to be a holiday, but you get, like, two seconds off the whole of your PGCE year."

"Do you need to be in, like, the library here or anything?"

Louis narrowed his eyes. "Why? And no, not really. I've got everything I need."

"I need to go back to London tomorrow. I've already been here a couple of days longer than I planned. I wondered if you wanted to, like, come back with me. I've got meetings and stuff, but if you've got coursework too—we could just, I don't know. Talk. Like, when we're not working."

"Liam—"

"We could go out and have dinner."

"Liam. You can't go out with me. People will see."

Liam's eyes shone. "Let them," he said.

"But people might find out."

"I've got nothing to hide."

"But you have. Me."

"No," Liam said. "I'm not hiding you. I'm not ashamed. You were the best thing in my life. You're not something to be ashamed of."

"Liam, fuck."

"No," Liam said. "Please. I want you just to come and stay. There's a spare bedroom if you don't want to share with me. I think we should talk."

"Talk?"

Liam trapped Louis's foot between his under the covers, just the way he always had. He might have bulked up and grown up and changed his hair, but some things stayed the same. "I don't know what I'm doing," he said. "I can't—I don't know how to walk away. I don't want to walk away. I was supposed to be in London two days ago. I lost you once. I can't leave this unfinished again. It hurt too much last time."

Louis's hands shook. "Unfinished?"

Liam swallowed. "I'm not pretending I don't still have feelings for you. But it's been almost four years. Surely we should have stopped loving each other in four years?"

A sob caught in Louis's throat. He swallowed it down. "God," he managed, and he wanted to beat his fists against Liam's chest at the unfairness of it all. 

"Come with me," Liam said. "Please. You can have as much time as you need for your coursework. Just for a few days. A couple of days. Whatever you want."

This was a terrible idea. It was prolonging the inevitable. It might make everything even more complicated, and it probably wouldn't solve anything, and Zayn would get that furrow in between his brows, and Niall would worry. 

"All right," Louis said, and Liam made an abortive attempt at reaching for him. Louis caught Liam's wrists in his hands, then wrapped his arms around Liam, pulling him in close. It was stupid, and they were stupid, but he couldn't seem to stop. Liam wrapped himself round Louis, until the two of them were pressed together, too hot and too close, and it wasn't near enough. 

"I loved you so much, Mr Payne," Liam said, mouth pressed to Louis's cheek. 

"Tomlinson-Payne," Louis said. They'd never fixed on a single surname. They'd kept their own. Sharing names still felt like a secret endearment. "I always said you should be Mr Tomlinson."

"Maybe I should have been," Liam said, not pulling away. "Liam Tomlinson."

"Better than Louis Payne."

There was a pause. "Yeah," Liam said softly. 

"Is this a terrible idea?" Louis asked, after a minute. Liam's hand slid around his waist, anchoring him close. Louis's heart pounded, but he wrapped an arm around Liam's back anyway, needing him to be close in a way he'd never wanted so much before. 

"Probably," Liam said, his mouth brushing Louis's temple as he shifted position, the duvet tucked up around them as they kept on hugging. Louis shivered, unable to help himself. "I just think—I can't walk away. Not again. I left not knowing all this stuff last time and it's messed me up ever since. And I reckon you've never—has it been the same for you?"

Louis nodded, his fingers at the nape of Liam's neck. "Inside. I didn't even tell my mum the truth."

"Oh, Lou." Liam's mouth was so close to his, his breath warm against Louis's cheek. "My Louis."

Louis tried to breathe. "I did it for you."

"I know," Liam said. "And don't think that I'll ever, ever forget it." His voice caught. 

Louis kissed him again, his mouth pressed to Liam's, breathless with it. This was such a bad idea, but Liam had been everything to him for so long. "I love you," he said. "I'd thought I'd stop. I thought it would be okay."

Liam's mouth was sleepy and pliant and familiar, even after all this time. The way he licked his way into Louis's mouth hadn't changed, and the way Louis nipped at him with his teeth so that Liam would whine in the back of his throat—it was all the same. His hand in Liam's hair—so much shorter now, and less curls for Louis to pull—the sounds Liam made as he kissed Louis back. 

This time, Louis didn't pull away, and neither did Liam. They stayed kissing until Louis could feel his dick fattening up in his shorts, and feel it reflected in Liam against Louis's thigh. 

"I can't—" Liam said, forehead to Louis's. "I can't have sex with you."

"I know," Louis said. His hand stayed in Liam's hair. He wasn't entirely sure he could come back from that either. "Should we stop?" He didn't want to stop. He wanted to keep kissing Liam until he fell asleep touching him. 

"I don't want to," Liam told him, touching his lips to the corner of Louis's mouth. "But I know what I was like the last time this all went wrong. I'm scared, Lou. I'm scared of it hurting like that again."

Louis nodded. He knew what that felt like, that fear. That hurt. He let out a ragged breath, and shifted a little in Liam's arms, pulling his hips back so that his dick wasn't touching anything of Liam's. Then he kissed Liam's cheek. 

Liam managed half a smile against Louis's mouth. "Don't make me stop hugging you. Please."

"I couldn't even if I tried."

Louis didn't mean to fall asleep like that, wrapped up in Liam's tight hug, but he did.

He didn't wake up until he felt Liam trying to extricate himself from Louis's arms. 

"Don't go," Louis said, his heart already pounding. 

"Not without you," Liam said, getting out of bed, but making sure all the duvets were up and tucked around Louis. "Unless you don't want to come to London anymore?"

"I'll come," Louis said, rolling onto his side. "Do you want to go now?"

"I've got a meeting at lunchtime. I'll go and make us some tea and toast."

"It's my house. I should be making you breakfast."

Liam swallowed. He looked so handsome, standing there in Louis's clothes. It made Louis's heart contract. "Let me look after you for a bit, all right? Let me make you breakfast."

It was a minute before Louis nodded his _all right_. 

~*~

Niall clearly thought him going to London was a fucking terrible idea. Even Zayn, who'd been woken up at least six hours before he'd intended, woke up enough to give Louis his best worried expression, and a sleep-addled lecture about Louis getting hurt. 

"I know, all right," Louis said. Liam had left to walk back to his hotel, to pack up his stuff and drive back to pick Louis up in half an hour. "I know it's a fucking stupid idea, and I'm going to come back with a new and improved extra-specially painful broken heart, but Liam's _right_. There's no fucking way I'm ever going to get over him if I don't talk to someone about it, if I don't find a way to move the fuck on."

"I just don't think that going to stay in Liam Payne's house is necessarily the way to move on," Zayn said. 

"Maybe it is, though," Louis persisted. "I need to talk about me and Liam. I need to know that he's happy and he's got a future, and that I've got one too. I lied to him and made him leave, and it might have been for the right reasons, but I don't like lies, and I've been living one. I don't know. It's stupid, and I'm getting hurt now, but maybe it might help sort us out. It might sort me out."

"You should call us," Niall said. "Like, six times a day."

Louis tried to smile. "I've been keeping it secret for so long that I don't know how to talk about it. I'm married. Like, I'm still married. I haven't said that out loud since before I came to uni. I need to be able to say it out loud, so I can follow it up by saying I'm divorced."

"God, Louis."

"I thought I'd met my soulmate, you know? Like, I saw him, and I knew he was special. I knew he was worth it. And back then, he was—" Louis stopped. "My teachers said I wouldn't amount to anything. Liam always said I would."

"But you have," Zayn said. "And you did it without him. You don't need him to tell you you're worth something. You've got us, and your degree, and all of the rest of your mates. You've done all this without him."

"He knew it when I wasn't anything, though," Louis said. "He knew it when I couldn't keep a job in fucking McDonalds. I think I'm here because when I made him go, I wanted to do something to make me worthy of him. I know it sounds stupid, and I know you think I'm making a massive mistake, but he, like, he changed my life. And now I need to know how to finally move on, and maybe the way to do that is to, what the fuck, consciously uncouple or whatever the shit Pepper Potts said."

"You're mad," Zayn said. "I love you, and we'll be here waiting when you come back, but I think you're asking for trouble."

Niall leaned over and gave him a hug. "I know you love him, all right, but it's not going to be the same. You've been separated for years. You're both different people now."

Louis shook his head. "I know you think I'm crazy. I know it. And I know that it seems like I'm really fucking obsessive, and I know I am when it comes to Liam. But I need to finish this. Somehow I need to finish this."

"Not obsessive, just, like, intense." Niall patted him on the knee. "Look, just try and take it easy, okay? Try not to expect miracles."

"I never do," Louis said. "I'm going to stick _Red Dwarf_ on while I pack, do you want to watch it with me?"

"Only if I can get under your duvet," Zayn said. "It's fucking freezing."

"Deal," Louis said, and tried to stop his heart from pounding. 

~*~

Liam was late coming back to pick him up. Louis had all his coursework notes and files in one of those plastic collapsible folding boxes that Niall kept a supply of under his bed, and his laptop and all of his clothes in the same battered, Adidas sports bag he'd originally moved to Wolverhampton with, all that time ago. He'd sneaked in a smart pair of shoes and a shirt in case they went out for dinner, hoping that Zayn and Niall weren't watching as he shoved it in the bag. 

They had been. 

Louis ignored them, put his bag out on the landing, and watched _Red Dwarf_ until after the time Liam was due over. 

"Has he texted you?" Niall asked finally. 

Louis shook his head. "Watch the telly," he said.

"Maybe you could text him," Zayn suggested. "Ask where the hell he is."

"It's fine," Louis said. "Watch the telly."

"Louis—"

"Leave it," Louis said. "Really."

Inside he was terrified. His phone was in the pocket of his jeans, but he was too embarrassed to get it out and see if there was a message. Or to message Liam himself, and ask him why he was late. 

Because the thing was, Liam was never late. He was only late when he was with Louis because Louis made him late. Louis was always the one leaving things until the last minute. That's how it had always been.

Liam was twenty-five minutes late. 

"Text him," Niall said. 

"Fine," Louis said, and got his phone out. He typed out _Are you still coming?_ and pressed send. Half of him didn't expect an answer. 

One came two minutes later. _Sorry soz sorry got stuck on the phone but have moveed my meeting for later this afternoon coming over now sorry sorrry xx_

Louis chucked his phone at Niall and Zayn for them to see. Zayn leaned over and wrapped his arm around Louis's shoulders. "You can ring us whenever you want, Lou."

"You'll be asleep, or you won't hear your phone," Louis said. "But thanks."

Zayn kissed his cheek. "One for all and all for one."

"Muskehounds are always ready," Louis finished. He bumped his knee into Niall's. "Swear you're faithful to your king."

"Seriously," Niall said. "We're here for you. We would have been all along if we'd known."

"I was all right," Louis said. "Most of the time I was fine."

"The rest of the time, then," Niall said. "If we'd known."

"I was all right," Louis said again. "Can I take the _Dogtanian_ DVDs?"

"If you lose them you have to replace them," Niall said, but he was already climbing off the bed and padding downstairs, coming back up with volumes 1-4. Niall always kept his DVDs in alphabetical order. Louis barely kept his in the same room. 

He was just dumping the DVDs in his bag when the doorbell rang, and Niall went back downstairs to grab it. 

"We were just losing all hope for you," Niall said, but he was smiling, and tugging Liam into a hug. "Be careful with him, all right? He's not as tough as he looks."

"Niall, shut up," Louis said. He was trying to negotiate the stairs with his bag and the box of papers, and their stairs were a mess of old socks and things to go upstairs and stuff that had been dumped there for no good reason at the best of times. 

Liam—freshly showered and changed out of Louis's jogging bottoms—took the stairs two at a time to take the box from Louis. "Hi," he said, going carefully down the stairs. "Sorry I'm late."

"It's okay," Louis lied. He'd banked on Liam being on time. That was the Liam he'd known. He fucking hated change. "So, uh, lads. I'll see you, all right?"

"I'll be careful with him," Liam promised. "I'll bring him back to you in one piece."

"You better had do," Zayn said. He had his arms folded. 

"It'll be fine," Louis told him, which might not have been the exact truth, but it would do for now. "And I'll Skype you when I'm stuck on the coursework."

"Yeah, yeah," Zayn said, and when Louis had stowed his stuff in the back of Liam's Range Rover, and climbed up into the front seat, he looked back to see both Zayn and Niall standing in their open doorway, waving them off. Louis waved at them until they turned the corner, and the car fell into silence. 

"They, uh, love you a lot," Liam said.

"Yeah," Louis said. "Best friends the whole of uni."

"You never, like, thought about telling them?"

Louis shook his head. This car was brand new. It still smelled like it was in a showroom. He'd never really been in a brand new car before. "It never came up," he said. "The first few weeks at uni it was all right that I was drunk all the time. I didn't—I didn't know how to say I'd loved someone and lost them, and I couldn't tell them the lie, that I didn't love you anymore. So I didn't say anything. I just, I don't know, got used to not saying anything. That bit of me got quiet."

Liam glanced at him. He looked different behind the wheel of a car, more grown up. He hadn't had his driving licence when he and Louis had been together. Louis had, but he'd sold his nan's old car when he'd needed a deposit for the shit, damp bedsit in Wolvo. Louis couldn't imagine what a car like this must have cost, but it was clearly a lot more money than Louis had ever had in his life.

"You've never been quiet," Liam said. 

"I am about you," Louis said. "I did all this so you could be free of me. I wasn't going to fuck it all up by telling the wrong person."

Liam's knuckles on the steering wheel were white. 

Louis looked out of the window at the houses sliding by, and chewed on his thumb nail. 

"Sometimes I'm so fucking mad at you, you know?" Liam said. "Everything I thought for the last four years, it's been wrong. It's not what I thought it was. I'm having to, like, rewrite stuff in my head. I'm so confused."

"I'm sorry," Louis said. "I'm so sorry."

"Everything I learn about what you did for me, it makes me want to, like, yell. Tell you you didn't need to do it."

"I did," Louis said. 

"But I also just want to say thank you, too. For everything you sacrificed. For all the stuff you did so that I could have this."

Louis nodded, but didn't look at him. If he stayed staring out of the window, he didn't have to cry. "Are you going to tell your mum and dad?"

"I've already told them," Liam said, and he sounded a little surprised. "I told them as soon as I found out. You've told your mum, right?"

"No," Louis said. "I can't tell her I lied to her."

"Louis... She's going to find out. You tell your mum everything. Or you did. Has that changed?"

"She's married now, you know," Louis said. "I mean, like, married again. I've got a little brother now. And another little sister. They're twins. Doris and Ernie."

"That's really nice," Liam said. "Am I allowed to tell you that I already knew she was married?"

Louis twisted in his seat. "What the fuck?"

"I went looking for her on Facebook. She's locked down, but, like, two years ago her profile picture was her getting married."

"Why'd you look?"

"I don't know, I was miserable and drunk and Googling you."

"What did you find?"

"Not much. A locked Facebook. A Twitter that might have been your sister. I phoned Ruth up and she made me stop looking."

"Probably for the best," Louis said. He waited a minute. "I used to go through your Instagram. When you gave me your phone at the club, I recognised your dog from the pictures you'd put up."

"I just..." Liam trailed off. "I don't know why I couldn't ever properly put you behind me."

"I don't know either," Louis said. "I wished I could. But I never—" he stopped. "In the end I stopped trying. I got my tattoo and I just thought, you know, this is how it is. You're inside of me somewhere, and you're staying."

Liam didn't say anything to that. There wasn't anything to say. Louis turned the radio on, and flicked through the stations until he found one that was playing something he liked. He got his phone out, and typed out a text to his mum. _In a car with liam. Going to stay with him in London for a couple of days. I'll call you later. Love you x_

He didn't send it. He deleted it instead, and put his phone back in his pocket. 

~*~

Liam lived in a posh building somewhere in North London, with its own little car park. It didn't seem entirely to Liam's tastes, although Louis was almost four years out of date with what Liam liked and didn't like. The area seemed a little staid, though, and the cars weren't like Liam's. There was a Waitrose just down the road, and a lot of shops that sold bathrooms and ugly, expensive homewares. 

The journey down had been quiet, conversation revolving mostly around the radio. They'd stopped once, at a Welcome Break, and Louis had queued for coffees for them both rather than go into the toilets with Liam. A couple of young girls asked Liam for his autograph, their mum going over with them, and Louis watched from behind a pillar, coffees in hand, as Liam crouched down and talked to the girls for a minute before signing the magazine they'd just bought, with Liam on the cover. 

Louis had always liked watching Liam interact with kids. He'd always harboured a stupid, ridiculous fantasy about the two of them growing up and having kids of their own, but it had been nonsensical. Liam would never have been satisfied with the life Louis could have offered him, not in the long run. Louis's adventure was a small one, whereas Liam's was huge. The hugest. He deserved the world. 

The parking space outside Liam's flat had an engraved sign above that said _reserved for flat 7._ Louis hadn't ever even seen a flat that came with its own reserved car parking. He got out of Liam's car, and went round to the boot so he could shoulder his sports bag and get a hold of his box of papers. Liam had a big suitcase, a rucksack, and a sports bag, and they bumped their way over to the main entrance so that they could go up to Liam's flat. 

There was a doorman working the desk. He got the lift for them, and Louis listened as Liam asked him how he was, and how his family was. 

This world was so different to anything Louis could ever have given him.

Liam's flat was on the seventh floor, and at the back of the building. Louis stood in the entrance, box in hand, uncertain whether to step over the threshold. Liam dumped his stuff on the floor of the hall, and turned around. 

"Come in," he said. "Come in. It might be a bit of a mess. I don't think I tidied before I left." 

They went through into a large, open plan living room with an imposing fireplace at one side, sofas and a big flat screen television, a pool table at the other end, and a couple of guitars and a keyboard and a desk in the corner. Big, floor-to-ceiling windows led out onto a balcony, and Louis peered out of the windows to look down onto a gated garden with a couple of benches and an interesting sculpture that looked like a giant pile of balls. 

"This is the living room," Liam said. "Just dump your stuff on the floor. Or anywhere. I'll give you the tour." He looked nervous, although Louis wasn't sure why. This was the kind of expensive place that Liam deserved. "Behind you is the kitchen. Balcony out there." He went back out into the hall. "That's my room in there, and there are two spare bedrooms, this one—" he opened the door into one of them, which was boringly decorated in grey and purple, and looked expensive, drab, and unused, "and this one. Sorry it's so ridiculous. I don't know who they were decorating for." 

"Wow," Louis said. The room was decorated in mostly grey, except for a large, dark purple, cushioned headboard, that went almost all the way to the ceiling, and was surrounded by a mirrored border. There were at least eight pillows on the bed, all of them shades of grey and purple, and the bedside lamps looked like exquisitely fashioned, giant ribbed dildos. One of the cushions on the bed was mirrored. A door opposite opened into an en-suite, decorated in the same greys and purples. Everything was square, including the toilet, and it all looked like it had very sharp corners. "Did you, um, decorate it yourself?"

"It's rented," Liam said. "It came furnished. My record company found it for me. It's nice, but, like—who'd have this room?"

"I literally have no idea," Louis said. "Those lamps look like giant ribbed dildos."

Liam snorted. "Do you remember—"

Louis remembered. Poor and in love and trying to buy their first sex toys off a cheap as fuck website with their first credit cards. They'd been cheap and a nasty shade of neon, and Louis had made Liam come seven times in one night playing with them. "Yeah," he said, turning away. "What's your room like?"

"Bit better," Liam said. "Less mirrors. Do you want to see? I mean, like, you're welcome to stay in there with me. But if you don't want to, then there's one of these."

"I want to stay with you," Louis said, and he hadn't meant to say that. It had just come out. 

Liam glanced at him. He leaned over and slid his hand into Louis's. Louis's heart thumped. "Come and see, then."

Liam's room was white, with a lilac trim. It was clearly the most lived-in room in the flat, with two dressing rooms, an en-suite bathroom, and doors leading out onto the balcony. There were suitcases and clothes and trainers in the dressing rooms, and toiletries in the bathroom, and on the shelf above the bed, Liam's teddy bear from when he was growing up. 

Louis wanted to sob. It caught in his chest, and he shoved it down inside of him, refusing to give in. "You've still got Mr Puffles."

"Course I have," Liam said. "I'm going to have Mr Puffles until the day I die."

"He's got a new jumper."

"Mum made it for him. For Christmas last year."

"He still looks just the same. Even with the new jumper." Louis had cried all over Mr Puffles, back when he'd been making the decision to tell Liam he didn't love him anymore. Mr Puffles gave good hugs. Mr Puffles kept a lot of secrets. 

"Do you still have Hobbs?"

"Yes," Louis said. "I've still got him."

"Do you want to stay in here?" Liam asked, after a minute. 

Louis nodded. "Please," he said. "Just, like—I don't think I could be here and not be with you. I know it's..." he trailed off. "I know why we shouldn't."

"Me too," Liam said. "But I don't want you in one of those other rooms. I want you here. With me."

"Do you have a side?" Louis asked, pointing at the bed. 

"Same as always," Liam said. He pointed to the side closest to the window. "That one."

"Okay," Louis said, and then he let go of Liam's hand and went to get his bag, bringing it into the bedroom and putting it by the side of the bed. He crouched down so that he could find his mobile charger and plug it in; his mobile was down to eleven per cent. "It's got the battery power of a damp flannel," he said, setting it up on the bedside table. "It lasts about ten minutes, give or take."

Liam was leaning against the wall by the door, watching him. "Are you hungry?" 

"I could eat something," Louis said. "What have you got?"

"I think we probably need to go to the shop. Come and have a look in my cupboards."

"You've got tea though, right?" Louis asked, trailing him into the kitchen. 

"It's Tetley," Liam said. "And the milk's probably gone off."

"Christ," Louis said, opening the fridge to check the date on the milk. There was nothing in there but a lot of condiments, an orange that had seen better days, and the remains of some slightly floppy looking celery. "We do have to go to the shop." 

"I'll write a list," Liam said, opening one of the drawers and coming out with a notebook and a pen. "Tea Louis will drink, and milk," he said, writing it down. 

"I'll drink Tetley. It's what you have."

Liam shook his head. "I'll get you what you like."

It made Louis's heart hurt, is what it did. "When's your phone call?" he asked, to change the subject. "When did you move it to?"

"About an hour," Liam said. "We've got time. What do you want for breakfast? I've got bran flakes, but you hate them. We could get stuff for bacon sandwiches."

"Bacon," Louis agreed. "And eggs. Have you got proper brown sauce?" He opened the fridge again. "Fuck, Liam, what the fuck is Wilkin and Son's Tiptee Brown Sauce?"

"It's all Waitrose had," Liam said. "But I could drive us somewhere better."

Louis frowned. "No," he said. "It's fine. Wherever you go normally."

"Louis—"

"It's all right."

"No," Liam said. "Let me look after you for a bit."

"You don't have to," Louis said. "You really don't have to. I've done all right by myself."

"Just, like—it's for a couple of days," Liam said. "You're here and you're my guest. Let me just look after you for a couple of days."

It took a long, long time for Louis to nod his _okay_. 

"Good," Liam said. "What do you want for your tea?"

"Anything," Louis said, opening the fridge again. It looked just the same as it had a minute ago. "Like, whatever's easy. Pizza or something. We can get it from the shop."

"I want to cook," Liam said. "I'll cook you something."

"All we can cook is beans on toast and oven chips," Louis said, without thinking. "I mean. That's what we could cook." Even Louis was better than that now. He could survive on a much wider selection of frozen stuff he could bung in the oven now. "You might have learnt new stuff. I bought an actual carrot last week. The freezer in Tesco with all the peas in it was broken, so it was that or have two chicken kievs for my tea. I had to ring Mum to find out if I could cook it without peeling it, 'cos I was lazy. She said it was all right if I didn't. If we're cooking in our house, it's mostly Niall. Zayn does it sometimes, but usually only when he's back from his mum's and he's brought all this sick stuff with him. He doesn't do it that often, though. Niall's got actual cookery books—"

"Lou," Liam said. "I could do spag bol. You like spaghetti bolognese, right? Or at least, you did."

Louis looked down at his hands. "Yeah," he said finally. "I still like bolognese."

"Okay," Liam said, and he opened his drawer again and came back out with a sheaf of papers. "Mum taught me how to cook stuff," he said, putting them down on the counter. "I can do, like, ten things. Sometimes Harry comes over and cooks, though. He likes stuff like that."

"Why doesn't he cook at his own place?" Harry Styles was always in the papers. He'd been on the X Factor when he was, like, seventeen or something, but he'd ended up being more famous for wearing Yves Saint Laurent and being Liam's best mate, and then Nick Grimshaw off the radio's. He'd had two solo albums off the back of the X Factor, but he hadn't done much since. 

"He's bad at being by himself," Liam said. "He mostly stays on the sofa when he's here. He doesn't like the spare bedrooms either."

"You could redecorate them, or something," Louis suggested, going over and starting to leaf through the papers. They were recipes, all in Liam's mum's handwriting. "Karen's handwriting hasn't changed," he said. Leek and potato soup, chilli, spaghetti bolognese, shepherd's pie, how to cook a pork chop, and how to make banana bread; they were all there, and they'd all been used, judging by the crumples and the food splashes. 

"No," Liam said. "It's still the same."

It felt sad, somehow. Sad on the inside. 

"Come on," Liam said. He'd finished writing his shopping list from his mum's recipe. "Let's go to the shop."

~*~

They drove to the Sainsbury's on the High Road, Louis turning the radio on so they didn't have to talk. He looked out of the window at the shops nestled in next to each other, some of them high end furniture shops, next door to little scruffy greengrocers with posters in the window advertising cheap overseas phone cards. Lots of them sold fruit and vegetables in plastic bowls on tables outside the front. All these different people and lives and shops and jobs and cultures and history, all layered on top of each other, fitting in alongside each other like a complicated jigsaw. 

"Thanks for inviting me to stay," Louis said finally, as they were pulling into the Sainsbury's car park. "For, like, giving us time to talk."

Liam glanced at him as he looked for a parking spot. There was one in the far corner, furthest from the doors. "I want it to hurt less," he said. "For both of us."

"That'd be nice," Louis said. He waited until Liam had properly turned the engine off before getting out and standing awkwardly by the boot whilst Liam rooted around on the back seat. "Forgotten something?"

"Nope," Liam said, coming out brandishing a handful of bags for life. "Got them."

"God," Louis said. "You—fuck. Don't you have minions to do your shopping for you?"

"No minions," Liam said. "Just me. And it's good for the environment. Bringing your own bags. They'll replace them for free if they get knackered, you know."

 _I love you_ , Louis thought. Maybe it showed on his face, because Liam's face changed a little, something shifting in his expression. His eyes got soft. 

"Come on," Liam said, after a long moment. "Let's get you your tea."

"I'll drink what you've got," Louis protested. He'd complain about it, but he wasn't completely terrible. Not most of the time.

"No," Liam said. "I want to get you what you like."

"Spending all your money on me," Louis said, kicking the toe of his Vans against the Tarmac. "I'll have the Tetley."

Liam just shook his head. "No," he said. "You won't. Come on. I've got to be back for that phone call."

"At least let me carry the basket," Louis said, as they got near the entrance.

"We're getting a trolley," Liam said. "Here, my mum got me one of those trolley pound things." He handed Louis a little coin with a smiley face on both sides, unclipping it from his key ring. "You always did want to push the trolley when we went shopping with my mum."

He and Zayn and Niall didn't get trolleys. He and Liam hadn't either; it had only ever been when they went to help Liam's mum with the big shop. No point getting a trolley if you just had to carry it back from the shops anyway. 

"You've got a trolley pound," Louis said, to cover up the fact that he felt sad right down to the tips of his fingers. A stupid past life; a bit of history, that was it. It wasn't real life, not anymore. It wasn't now. 

"Well," Liam said apologetically. "I don't always carry cash."

"Course you don't," Louis said, as he pushed the trolley through the barriers into the fruit and veg section. "Well, what do we need?"

They got all the stuff they needed for the spaghetti bolognese, and for bacon sandwiches in the morning, and then Liam piled things in the trolley for Louis to have for lunch whilst Liam was out all day. 

"Where next?" Louis asked once Liam had deposited a whole French stick in the trolley. He was trying not to pay any attention to the two young girls who seemed to be following Liam around with their phones out. "Does that happen a lot?"

Liam went a bit pink. "I wish they'd just come up and say hi," he said, without looking at the girls. "It's a bit creepy, getting followed."

"Are they taking pictures of both of us?" Louis asked, a cold slither of fear taking root in his chest. 

"Probably just me," Liam said. "It's okay, anyway. Come on, let's go hide in the alcohol aisle. They're too young to follow us in there."

"But what if they find out—"

"They won't," Liam said in an undertone. "How could they? Anyway," he added as they turned up into the wine aisle, and Louis promptly found himself out of his depth. His wine choosing ability lay firmly in what he could get for £4.99 on special offer. "I'm not ashamed of any of it."

"But—"

"Let's not talk about here, all right?" 

Louis nodded, ducking his head. He didn't know where his words had gone. He'd been quiet about Liam for so long that he couldn't seem to reconnect the parts of his brain that made sentences. All of the things he wanted to say— _I love you_ and _do you remember how we were_ and _I wish we were like that now_ —they were all trapped inside somewhere, quiet and locked up. That fucking tiger was doing a good job of guarding it all inside of his head now, wasn't he? The worst kind of protector. Louis was going to have words. 

"I'm crap at wine," Liam said, staring at the shelves and shelves of red. "I just go for, like, whatever's on special offer and £8.99."

"Sounds good to me," Louis said. He wasn't looking at the red wine. He was looking at the bottles of pink fizzy nonsense wine, the kind that they'd celebrated getting married with. 

"We could get that instead."

Louis picked up a bottle of cheap Rosé Cava. "I think it was revolting then. I just didn't care."

"I think you've gone too upmarket," Liam said. He bent down to the bottom shelf, and stood up with a bottle of Lambrini Rosé. "Ringing any bells?"

"God," Louis said. "Fuck." 

"A whole £2.41," Liam said. "Do you want to?"

Louis's eyes swam. "Yeah," he said. "All right."

"We should have something nicer, too," Liam said, turning back around to the red wines. "How about this one?" 

It was a bottle of something called Chateau Cambon La Pelous Medoc. Louis didn't even know what that was. "All right. Hang on, no, that costs eighteen quid a bottle."

"It's on special offer," Liam persisted. "Anyway, I want to. Let me? Just this once."

"All right," Louis said. He couldn't ever afford a bottle of wine that cost that much. He and Zayn and Niall drank own-brand alcohol. He couldn't afford a bottle of bourbon that cost that much. "But you don't have to."

"I know," Liam said. "Do you want ice cream and chocolate sauce for pudding?"

"Yes," Louis said, and he didn't know why he felt so sad. 

~*~

Louis wandered round the flat whilst Liam was on his Skype call at the dining room table. He poked at the toiletries in Liam's en-suite, and figured out which deodorant he was using, and looked through his t-shirts to see if he had any old ones in there that Louis might have recognised. He picked out the first few bars of _all you need is love_ on the keyboard, but he didn't turn it on so it didn't disturb Liam on the phone. He looked at Liam's CDs and flicked through his DVDs, stopping when he got to _Flight of the Navigator_ , which was still wrapped in cellophane. He vaguely remembered seeing it when he was a kid, but not much else, other than that he'd liked it. He got it off the shelf and put it on the coffee table, before wandering out onto the balcony in socked feet and his hoodie. 

It was freezing. It was mostly dark outside, and cold as anything, and he leaned over the railing, looking down onto the garden below and its decorative balls. The house he had with Zayn and Niall was great; they'd been in it since the summer of their second year, staying on after third year into their PGCE year. It was small and scruffy and had a back yard the size of a thimble, which was only just big enough for Niall to get his barbecue out in the summer, whilst he and Zayn sat on the back step and smoked. The furniture was dilapidated and covered in old throws, and there was a good chance none of them would get their deposit back when they finally left. The tree out the front that got in the way of their gate was eventually going to fall down, or continue to grow sideways, and then they'd have to do more of a manoeuvre to get in the door than they did now. It was cheap, and decorated almost entirely in that awful woodchip wallpaper that had also covered the walls in the bedsit Liam and Louis had lived in. 

Louis was quite pleased, in a way; they'd kept this house for going on two years. It was his home; _their_ home. 

Liam had a flat screen telly mounted on the wall that was probably the same square footage as their bathroom. Louis wasn't jealous, as such; he'd never thought there was a chance he'd ever get to the point where he could live somewhere like this. But knowing that in an abstract way, and then standing here and knowing it for real, knowing it for concrete, absolute fact: that was different. 

He'd always known Liam was worth this, just the same as he knew he wasn't. 

"What are you doing out here?" Liam asked. "It's freezing."

"Just looking," he said. "You finished on the phone?"

"Yeah," Liam said. "You coming in?"

"In a minute," he said. He expected Liam to go back inside, but he didn't. He stepped out onto the balcony instead, coming over and standing at Louis's side. 

"You all right?"

Louis nodded. "Yeah," he said. "Just thinking."

"Come back inside. I'll get you a blanket."

It was too cold to be introspective. It was all right, anyway. In a couple of days he'd be heading back home and all of this would seem like a dream. 

Liam disappeared out into the hall whilst Louis shut the balcony doors and flicked the lock. He came back with a big, slate grey, furry blanket, almost the size of him. "Get this round you," he said, coming over and draping it around Louis's shoulders. It was almost intimate, being this close to him, Liam carefully wrapping the blanket around him. He rubbed Louis's bicep when he was all wrapped up. 

"How was your phone call?" Louis asked, wrapping the blanket tighter. 

"Fine," Liam said. "Boring schedule stuff. I forgot I was on the radio in the morning. And, like, this tour's coming up, right, and I've never done anything this big, so there are going to be a million meetings about what it's all going to look like and whatever." He shrugged a little awkwardly. "There'll just be me on that stage. I'll be tiny. Arenas are fucking huge."

Louis wanted to wrap the blanket around Liam, draw him into a hug and keep him here. "You're big enough," he said. "They're there to see you."

"I don't want to be a disappointment," Liam said. They were still stood so close together; Liam hadn't stepped out of Louis's space. 

Louis wrapped the blanket even tighter around himself. "You couldn't be," he said. Liam made him want to be sincere in a way no one else ever did. Maybe lying to Liam for so long had—in some queer way—made it impossible for him to do anything but tell him the truth now, regardless of what that was. "Go on," he said, trying to look away. "I thought you were going to make us our tea."

Liam nodded, stepping back. "Come and talk to me whilst I do it, then," he said. "You can open the wine."

Liam's kitchen was a slate grey affair, with deep plum drawer fronts and matching stools lined up by the kitchen island. Liam propped up the recipe on an actual recipe stand, and then proceeded to line up all the ingredients by the side of the stove. 

It was nice watching him, seeing him mouth out the amounts as he stepped between the island and the kitchen counter, setting the right amounts out ready to cook. Louis leaned his elbows on the counter as Liam started to chop the onion. 

"You should open the wine," Liam said, shooting him a soft smile.

Louis opened the most expensive bottle of wine he'd ever had with a bottle opener that he hadn't seen in almost four years, his thumb pressed against the little LL he'd scratched into the handle with the point of Liam's compass the day they'd got married, and poured two glasses out. 

"Wine," Louis said, sliding it along the counter. "Nice bottle opener."

"Yeah," Liam said. "It's a bit wobbly now, but it still works."

"Our tin opener gave up the ghost," Louis said. "But then, it never did fucking work."

"It was always shit," Liam agreed. He finished chopping the onion and moved on to the garlic. "Did you end up keeping any of our stuff? Or did you just, like, get rid of it?" He didn't look up, keeping his gaze firmly on the chopping board. 

Louis took a sip of his wine. It was rich and warm, and maybe there was a difference between a bottle you could get for under a fiver, and this. "I kept it all," he said. "Do you remember those utensils we got from the pound shop? The set of three? They're in the house now. They don't look like they were three for a pound."

"What do you mean, you kept it all?" His knife hovered over the garlic. 

Louis shrugged. "If I haven't got it with me, it's in boxes at my mum's." He swirled the wine around the glass a little. "I can't open it, you know. I can't go through it. She moved in with Dan and I made her take it all with her. It's in the attic there. I don't know. Some day she'll make me get rid of it. She hasn't yet, though."

"Why'd you keep it?" Liam asked. He pressed the flat of his knife to the garlic clove, pushing down until it squished a bit, and he could peel away the outside layer. "I just... I don't know. I thought maybe you wouldn't want anything around to do with me."

"I think you're mistaking me for someone who stopped loving you," Louis said finally. "But I loved every single last bit of you. Including your washing up bowl." He stopped for a moment. "I thought that one day you'd divorce me, but it wouldn't matter. I'd be okay. I'd have our toothbrush mug and the glasses we got from the pound shop, and I'd just be, like, okay."

"Lou—"

"I've been okay for a really long time," Louis said. "Are you going to drop me off home in a couple of days, and then, like, send me divorce papers?"

Liam leaned down and got a big pan out of the cupboard, standing up again and putting it on the stove. He didn't turn the hob on. "No," he said finally. He didn't look at Louis. "No, I'm not going to do that."

"Okay," Louis said. "This wine's nice. I can't believe you can cook now."

"I can cook a bit." He glanced across at Louis, throat working. "I could teach you, if you'd like."

"What, like, now?"

"If you want. Come and look at the recipe."

Louis tried not to stand too close, but it was difficult. "Where are we?"

"Here," Liam said, pointing at Karen's neat handwriting. "We're preparing the ingredients. We've done the onion and the garlic, and we need to grate the carrot and slice the celery next, and then chop up the mushrooms."

"Who puts carrot and celery into spag bol?"

"My mum," Liam says. "Here, take the grater and the carrot and start grating."

"Do I have to peel it?"

Liam handed him a peeler. "Go on. You know how to peel, right?"

Louis nodded. "Used to do it for my mum." He started to peel the two carrots, but he wasn't as fast at it as his mum was. Or Niall, for that matter. Niall mostly did the cooking, and Louis sometimes hung around and bugged him. It seemed fair that way. 

When he looked up, Liam was staring at him. 

"Stop watching me."

"I'm not watching you."

"You were," Louis said. 

"I'm looking at you, it's different."

"What's so different about it?"

Liam shrugged. He went a bit red. "Nothing's different about it," he said. "Just... I always liked to look at you."

Louis could feel himself going red too. "Suspect it's my wicked good looks," he said. "Or my stupendous bum."

"Both of those things," Liam agreed. "How's the grating going?"

"I peeled my finger a bit. But we're putting meat in it anyway, right? What's a little bit of extra blood?"

"I think that's how vampires got started, isn't it?"

Louis burst out laughing. "Yes, Liam," he said. "That's exactly how vampires got started."

~*~

Cooking took ages. Liam let Louis grate at his own speed, and it turned out Louis's grating speed was very slow. He made Louis do all the stirring, too, frying the onion and then adding the garlic and the mince until it was browned, and then adding the rest of the ingredients. They drank more of the wine, standing next to each other by the stove, sometimes bumping into each other as they gave the sauce a little stir. Louis at least knew how to make pasta, although spaghetti turned out to be a bit more daunting, as he poked gingerly at it with his fingers, trying to get it to soften enough that it slid into the pan. 

Liam just laughed. "You're a natural chef, Tommo."

"That's Mr Tomlinson to you," Louis said, kicking him in the ankle. "Or chef. That's what you're supposed to call me, isn't it? Like Gordon Ramsay."

"Just like Gordon Ramsay," Liam agreed. "Come on. Help me set the table."

"Don't tell me," Louis said, "you've got placemats that are all purple and grey."

"You've uncovered all of my secrets," Liam said, opening a drawer and coming out with a stack of purple placemats. "Take these, I'll get the cutlery."

They ate spaghetti bolognese at Liam's dining room table, with the _Twilight_ soundtrack on in the background, Liam swearing that the CD was Ruth's and not his. 

Louis poured them both more wine. The bolognese was nice, but Louis wasn't all that hungry. It was Liam he was interested in, Liam with his soft hoodie and his stupid jeans and his high tops, Liam with his stupid hair cut and his stupid smile and his heart, which it turned out Louis loved just as much as he always had. 

"Do you ever think about how different our lives might have been?" he asked. "If we hadn't met at that open day?" 

"Not really," Liam said. 

"We weren't supposed to be there at the same time," he said. He thought about this sometimes, the way the planets had aligned to put them both there. "Me and Zayn and Niall talk about it sometimes, you know. You know Niall tried out for the X Factor the same year Harry Styles did? He got on stage for the auditions and everything. Sang for Katy Perry but she said no. He got a yes from Simon Cowell, though. And Zayn sent in an application form too, but he couldn't be bothered to get out of bed."

Liam laughed. "Really? Can they sing?"

"Oh god, yeah. You should hear our harmonies. I'm the weak link, obviously."

"You can sing. You always could. Do you think you would have been the lead in Grease if you couldn't?"

"Don't, okay. Did I ever tell you I was going to go in for X Factor too? I must have been an idiot, I never would have got through the first audition. I think being in Grease must have warped my mind or something. For, like, two seconds I thought I was good at it."

Liam's face got sad. "Why didn't you ever tell me that?"

Louis shrugged. "Don't know. Didn't seem all that interesting. I didn't send the application in anyway, so it never mattered."

"I wish I knew when it was you stopped thinking you were worth something," Liam said softly, after a minute. "Because you are. You always were."

Louis looked down at his plate.

"Louis." Liam reached over and covered Louis's hand with his own. 

"Can we watch a film?" Louis asked, pulling his hand away. "I'm full, and I saw you had _Flight of the Navigator_. You haven't even opened it. I haven't seen that since I was little."

"Fine," Liam said, after a pause. "We can have ice cream later."

"Fine," Louis said, and he pushed his chair away from the table and stalked over to the sofa, his wine glass in one hand and the remains of the bottle in the other. He wrapped himself up in the blanket and settled himself at one end of the sofa. Liam—once he'd cleared the table and set up the DVD, set himself up at the other end of the sofa, under a contrasting blanket. 

They didn't talk. 

~*~

Two thirds of the way through _Flight of the Navigator,_ Louis reached for the pause button. 

"This was the worst film choice ever," Louis said. It had been stupid to pick it; a boy time travelled into the future and when he tried to go back home, it wasn't there anymore. Everything had changed, but he hadn't. He was just the same as he'd always been, but everything had moved on without him. Louis had liked it as a kid. Now it just felt like a really bad decision. "I'd forgotten most of what happened."

"I always wanted a little alien like the one he gets at the end," Liam said. "Nicola had this weird alien Boglin thing when I was little, and I thought it was just like the one in this. I thought she'd been in a spaceship."

"Had she?"

"Dunno," Liam said. "She never told me if she did. She might have done, though."

"Maybe you should ask her the next time you see her. See if she'll tell you the truth now you're not a kid." Louis picked at the knee of his jeans, then pointed at the TV. "I suppose, like, his family's changed, but at least they still love him."

"But he just wants to go back," Liam said. "He doesn't want to be in the future. He wants to go back."

Louis slumped against the back of the sofa. "You still talking about the film?"

"No," Liam said. "Are you?"

"Dunno," Louis said. "Do you mind if we don't watch the end?"

Liam stood up to get the remotes, then sat back down on the sofa, nearer to Louis this time, his knee brushing Louis's. "No. Put the telly on, or something. We can just put whatever on. Doesn't have to be a film."

Louis stabbed a few buttons on one of the remotes until something happened and lonely, time-travelling boys got parked for a bit. 

"You know he ends up happy, right?" Liam said, whilst Louis looked for the TV guide button on the Sky remote. 

"He ends up going back in time with his little squishy alien," Louis said. "He gets to go back so that everything's the same."

Liam looked down at his lap. "He's not the same, though. He's changed."

"Everybody changes," Louis said. "But, like, we haven't got a fucking time machine."

"I know we haven't got a time machine."

"I wish we did," Louis said, looking down at his lap. "And then, like, I wish we didn't either, because I want you to have this. I want you to live in this flat and have this huge fucking TV, and I want you to be on the radio in the morning, and to have Skype conversations about your massive arena tour, and I want people to love you. I want you to have this. I want you to sing and for you to love it, and even if we did have a fucking time machine, and we could go back, I would still want to give you this." He looked up. "I'd still want you to have all of this, Liam."

Liam leaned in and kissed him, his mouth covering Louis's. "You're just, like—" He slid his hand into Louis's hair, and Louis's breath caught in his throat, his heart pounding. "Meeting you was the best thing that ever happened to me."

"Not the worst?" Louis asked, chewing his lip. He could feel Liam's breath against his skin. "If I had a shit teenage marriage I had to hide from everyone, I'd call it the worst."

Liam shook his head. "No," he said softly. 

"Even with the way it ended?" Louis asked, unable to help himself. "You said I broke your heart."

"You did," Liam said. "You broke it so much I thought it wouldn't ever be fixed."

"Well then, you're an idiot if you don't call that the worst."

"I'm not an idiot," Liam said. His hand was still in Louis's hair. "And I know how much you got hurt too. And why you did it."

"For your flat screen television," Louis tried to joke. "So you could have a pool table in your living room."

"No," Liam said. "I know why you did it. And what it meant. What it means."

"I just want a squishy little alien thing I can call my own," Louis said. He tried to laugh but he couldn't. It got caught in his throat. 

"Will I do instead?"

"Instead of a squishy little alien pet? Dunno, do you fit in my pocket?"

"I want to kiss you again," Liam said. "Can I?"

Louis closed his eyes. Maybe trying to protect himself against getting hurt again was just a stupid fucking idea. It was certainly pointless. The floodgates were already open; the tiger in his head had let him down, and everything was unlocked again, every feeling he'd tried so hard to lock away was here, in bright, panoramic Technicolor. Maybe the circumstances were different this time, but in a couple of days he was going to have to walk away from this marriage a second time, and the first time had almost broken him. "Yeah," he said softly. He didn't open his eyes. 

Liam leaned in, and brushed his mouth against Louis's. He stayed right there, not moving, and Louis trembled, unable to help himself, before Liam kissed him. 

Louis made a soft, stupid, desperate sound in his throat, and then Liam was cupping Louis's face in his hands, and Louis was reaching for him, and they were kissing again, but properly this time. Liam's hands were in his hair, and Louis clutched at Liam's hoodie, pulling him closer, kissing him over and over like this time was the last time, and they had to make it count. 

Knowing it really might be the last time was the saddest thing Louis could imagine, and he fisted his hands in Liam's jumper, shifting their positions until they were sprawled together on the sofa, their legs tangled together and the only light coming from the muted TV guide on the screen. Louis stroked his thumb over Liam's cheek.

"I fancied you the moment I saw you, you know," he said, kissing the corner of Liam's mouth. "I saw you and I knew I had to talk to you. I knew you were important."

"I wasn't important," Liam said. He slid a hand into the small of Louis's back, anchoring him close. 

"You were to me," Louis said. "You changed my life. It doesn't matter that we're, like, fucked. That's the thing I wished you knew. Before, you know. When you thought I didn't—"

"When I thought you'd stopped loving me."

"I thought you might not know how important you were to me." It felt like the time to share secrets: the quiet, the dark outside, the two of them together after so long apart. 

"I missed you so much," Liam said. "I still do, you know? Something happens and I still think, _I've got to tell Louis_. Harry just—I tell him sometimes. The stuff that I wished I could tell you. He's good at doing that. Being there."

"I'm glad you have him."

"I'm glad you have Zayn and Niall."

"Best mates, hey?" Louis tried to laugh. He reached up and stroked Liam's hair. "I can't believe how you've changed. Your hair. Your shoulders. Your everything."

"I haven't changed that much," Liam said. "I'm the same inside."

"Bit stronger, maybe," Louis said. "You believe in yourself more. I always said you should."

"You've changed too," Liam said. "You're so grown up."

"I always was grown up. Just didn't act like it." He stroked his thumb over Liam's jaw. He needed to shave. 

"No, but, I mean, like—" Liam tilted Louis's chin up. "I can't explain it. You were always, like, rushing to try the next thing. You wanted to stay up all night and see everything and work somewhere else. You got bored so easily. Now you're just, like, more settled. Do you think it's that you're doing something you love?"

Louis shrugged. He hadn't really thought about it like that. "I never really succeeded at anything before. I just scraped by and failed and tried again. I didn't try that much because I knew that I'd fail."

"But?"

He shrugged again. "I tried and I didn't fail," he said finally. "I worked so hard. I've never worked for anything. I just—I don't know. Scraped by. Like, peaks and troughs. I'd try a bit and then fail a bit and try a bit again. I don't do that so much now. Niall and Zayn balance me out a bit. Like you used to do."

"I wish I'd been at your graduation."

"You can see the pictures," Louis said. "They're on my Facebook."

"If I add you, will you add me back?" Liam asked. "On Facebook."

There was nothing sensible about any of this, but then, when had Louis ever been sensible? "Yeah," he said. "Add me on anything and I'll add you back."

"Okay," Liam said. He paused. "I've got to get up really early in the morning. Do you want to just, like, go to bed? My Macbook's in there, anyway. We can go on Facebook." He didn't add _before you change your mind_. 

Louis heard it anyway. 

~*~

They didn't go to sleep. They changed into t-shirts and pyjama bottoms and sat up in Liam's bed instead, with Liam's laptop propped up between them. Liam's Facebook wasn't under his own name; he was Will P. James. Louis leaned over and navigated to his own Facebook, and watched as Liam pressed the _add friend_ button. 

When the alert came through on his phone, Louis added him back, and just like that, they were in each other's lives again. 

"So," Liam said. "Where are these graduation pictures, then?"

Louis shuffled a little closer, until their knees were bumping together under the duvet, and nudged the laptop onto Liam's knee. "Just click on the photos," he said. "And then scroll down and I'll tell you when to stop."

Except Liam didn't; he clicked on the most recent picture—Niall's, taken before they'd left for the club the night Liam had slid back into his life, Niall and Zayn and Louis doing shots at home to celebrate the end of their teaching practice—and started to scroll back through Louis's pictures, one at a time. 

He wrapped an arm around Louis's shoulders, and Louis burrowed into his side and watched as Liam clicked back through his life, one picture at a time. His Facebook really was mostly him and Niall and Zayn, hanging out at home and partying and barbecuing and holidaying in Corfu last summer. Their other friends slid in and out of the frame with some degree of regularity, but mostly Louis's life was Zayn and Niall. He gave Liam a sleepy running commentary as to who the other people were, the ones who kept showing up in the corners of their pictures, friends from his course, friends from his undergraduate degree that had stayed around after graduating, his sisters. 

Liam stopped at those ones. "They've grown up," he said, at the picture of Lottie and Fizzy and Louis, all making stupid faces at the camera. 

"Everybody grows up," Louis said. He rolled his eyes. 

"No, I mean—they're practically adults. When did that happen?"

"At some point in the last three years and however many months. They just got older." He stopped, and fisted his fingers in the duvet. "Do you want to see a picture of my baby brother and sister?"

"I can't believe you've finally got a baby brother," Liam said. "Course I want to see one."

Louis reached for the laptop, and opened up an incognito window so he could log into Facebook without logging Liam out. He found his mum's, and opened up her pictures. "That's Doris," he said, pointing at a sleepy little girl curled up in his mum's lap wearing a Christmas jumper and clutching a toy monkey, "and that's me and Ernest." Louis was sitting on the floor by the Christmas tree, teaching Ernie how to fistbump. Both of them were laughing. 

"Do you think me and you would have ever had kids?" Liam asked, still staring at the screen. 

Louis shook his head. "Don't," he said. "Really, don't." Because the thing was, Louis did want kids. He wanted to be a dad so much it made his heart hurt sometimes, but he couldn't see it happening. He had to stop loving Liam before he could even think about loving someone else enough to have kids, and nothing he'd tried so far had worked. 

Liam was quiet for a minute. "I—" he stopped. "Sorry," he said. "That wasn't fair."

Louis shrugged. "Go back if you want to see my graduation pictures. We're not there yet."

Liam took the laptop back. There was an awkward kind of silence, and Louis was suddenly desperately aware of all the places where he was touching Liam. He tried not to move; his heart pounded. 

"I'm sorry," Liam said. He'd stopped looking at the pictures individually, instead scrolling down the archive until he got to last summer. "I shouldn't have asked that."

"It's all right," Louis said. "There. Do the morning ones first. It's just me and Niall and Zayn having breakfast, look. Niall cooked us a special one, for all our families. Niall's parents even had a conversation, and Niall said that never happens." It had been a bacon, veggie sausage or egg butty production line, with all their families turning up and hanging out before they went to get ready for their afternoon graduation, and Louis had loved every single second of that whole day. By the time Liam got to the pictures of the three of them in their suits in the back yard, arms around each other, Louis could feel the pride starting to show up again, that heat in his belly that felt like success. 

Liam didn't click the next picture; he just kept staring at this one. "You look so handsome," he said, "and so happy." He sounded a little choked up. 

"I was," Louis said, and he tried not to think about children, or the future, or anything that wasn't how that day had felt, pure fucking achievement running through his veins. "I did something," he said. "I went to uni, and I fucking aced it. A 2:1, Liam. Me. A 2:1."

Liam was still staring at the screen. "I always knew you were brilliant."

"That day I knew it too," Louis said. He'd never admitted it to anyone before, just how proud he'd been of himself for getting through it. "I'd never felt like that before. I've got a BA in Education. Me."

"You," Liam said. "You did that." He clicked on the next one; it was the three of them in their black graduation gowns, with their caps perched on their heads, still in the back yard. The next one changed location, to outside the university, and then after that, to a blurred photo of the back of Louis's head as he crossed the stage to receive his graduation certificate in a navy blue tube embossed with the university's logo. 

"Is that you?" Liam asked. 

"Yeah," Louis said. "Officially graduating."

The next one was Louis with his mum outside the hall, the two of them beaming with their arms around each other, Louis's graduation certificate in his hand. 

Liam pushed the laptop lid closed, and put his laptop down on the floor by the side of the bed. "I'm so proud of you, you know."

"Liam—"

"No," Liam said. "I know what that meant to you."

Maybe Liam did, and maybe he didn't. He'd missed so much of Louis's life, but he'd been there for things that no one else had ever known. Sharing what his teachers had said to him about not being worth anything. Constantly failing to keep a job. Endless nights where they had no money and they'd ended up playing cards and watching telly and talking for hours about everything and nothing. Liam knew him in a way no one else ever had, even though he'd missed the newer stuff. The part where Louis was a success. 

"It meant everything," Louis said, and he'd never said this to Zayn or Niall or his mum—or at least, not explicitly. He waited a beat. "Proudest day of my life, that."

"I want to come to the next one," Liam said. "I want to see you be that proud."

"Still time for me to fuck it up yet," Louis said, and he tried to laugh, but he couldn't. There was always a last hurdle, and he'd failed at it so often before. 

Liam slid his arm around Louis's shoulders again, and kissed the top of his head. "I'll be there," he said. "When you graduate. When you're a qualified teacher."

Louis was so, so tired. It was exhausting, trying to find a way through. "You've got an interview in the morning," he said finally. "You need to get some sleep."

"Suppose," Liam said, but it was late, and Liam wasn't going to get enough sleep as it was. They busied themselves settling down and separating and lying awkwardly apart, both of them staring up at the ceiling as Liam turned off the light. 

It was another couple of minutes before Louis closed his eyes. "I want you there," he said. "At my graduation. Watching me."

Liam reached for him then, sliding his hand into Louis's under the covers. "I'll be there," he said softly, and Louis fell asleep still holding his hand. 

~*~

Liam left too early for Louis to properly wake up and say goodbye, but he remembered Liam kissing his forehead as he left. It still felt like the middle of the night, and that was because it _was_. Liam was due on Radio 1 at quarter to eight; it meant waking up at arse o'clock. 

Louis's alarm woke him up in time to listen. He pottered round the kitchen making tea, wrapped in his grey fluffy blanket, listening to Nick Grimshaw blathering on about not much at all in the run up. He'd never really bothered listening to Nick's show—on too early for students, and all that—but he'd used to listen to Chris Moyles back in the day. He made toast, slathering it in blackcurrant jam, and settled himself on the sofa as they played the last song before Liam came on. 

It was weird, this life that Liam lived. Friends with Nick Grimshaw, friends with Harry Styles, selling out an arena tour. It almost seemed imaginary, even though Louis was sitting in Liam's living room, seeing the in-real-life fruits of Liam's labours. 

His phone buzzed with a text. It was Niall: _you listening to the radio?_

 _Yep_ , he texted back. _Might be a terrible idea_. 

_Might be. You want to skype afterwards? Gonna get a headstart on the coursework._

Louis texted back a yes. It was the only way he'd managed to work, back when he was still learning about how to concentrate at uni. He still found it difficult; his attention wandered all the time, and there was always something more interesting that he could be doing, but it had got easier with time. He still wanted to do something else, but he'd learned how to work in bursts, and how to make those bursts actually profitable. Skyping with the boys helped; they'd sit in their own rooms, linked together via Skype, and it was easier to behave if someone watched. 

"And now, let's say a very big Breakfast Show welcome to Liam Payne!" 

Louis turned his attention back to the radio. He'd listened to Liam's interviews before, but never whilst sitting in Liam's flat, actually a part of Liam's life. Liam sounded a little shy but happy to be there, saying all the right things when he thanked Nick for having him on. Nick was one of Liam's friends by association, through Harry Styles, and that was even weirder than Louis's husband being on the radio. These famous people were all linked together; it was so weird. 

He listened as Liam recounted a funny story about his first signing session, when he'd sat down on the chair provided for him and it had immediately collapsed under him, right in front of a queue of fans. Nick bounced a story back about falling down behind the DJ booth at a club one night, and accidentally bringing a stack of CDs down with him. 

It was an easy interview, nothing too complicated, just chatting about Liam's upcoming tour and the next single from his album, which—if the listeners didn't know—was available for download now. 

Louis had the album already, but he bought the single off Amazon on his phone anyway, just because he could. He might be Liam's husband in name only, but it wasn't going to stop him from supporting him by buying stuff twice. 

"So, then," Nick said, once they came back from a Sam Smith record. "Liam Payne has spent the last three minutes and forty-one seconds yawning, everybody. What kept you up so late last night, Mr Payne? Anything exciting?"

"Oh, you know," Liam said. "It's all go if you're a pop star."

"I can only imagine," Nick said. "So what did you get up to that's got you yawning like a yawning thing the moment the mics are off?"

"Not much," Liam said. "I only got home yesterday. I was doing a couple of sessions and signings and I ended up spending a couple of extra days away. You know what it's like when you get home. There's no food in the house and your milk's gone off. I ended up having to turn right back around and go to the shop. Otherwise I'd be hungry as well as yawning this morning."

"Cook anything nice? I made a spinach pie for my friend last night. I'm getting good at that now. Do you think I ought to get, like, a second recipe? They've been eating nothing but spinach pie for the last three years. Whenever they come over, it's like, bam, I'm getting the spinach out. They probably hate spinach, but they don't know how to tell me."

"Mine's spaghetti bolognese," Liam said. "I can do a good spaghetti bolognese, so I made that last night for me and my friend. I've got, like, ten recipes though. My mum gave them to me."

"They do that, don't they, mums? When you move out of home for the first time, they give you a cook book, like you're not going to be living on pot noodles and oven chips for the foreseeable future."

"Good, wholesome food, the pot noodle," Liam said. Louis couldn't help but remember endless meals of Asda Smart Price curry noodles. 

"Keeps you full, anyway. I had a friend at uni who kept trying all this weird stuff. I went round hers a few weeks ago, she gave us chickpea and tinned peach curry."

There was a silence, then Liam said, "...Really?"

"Yeah. And you know what? It was dead nice after all that. Just goes to show."

"It does."

Louis wasn't sure what exactly it showed, but there was one thing that was true, and that was: he wasn't ever eating that. Curried peaches? What the fuck. He sent Liam a text that just said, _I'm not eating that_. He didn't expect a reply. 

"So," Nick went on. "Your next single. Tell us about it, then, Liam Payne."

"It's called _Make My Day_ ," Liam said. "It's about, like, those people you meet who drive you mad, you know? And you end up fighting with them about the stupidest stuff, and pushing each other, yeah? And you kind of want to yell at them, go on then, make my day. But they're the same people who absolutely make your life better, too. And you see them and they, you know, make your day. Those people."

"Those people?" Nick asked, and Louis could practically hear him raising an eyebrow. 

"That person," Liam said. His voice sounded pretty even. There was a pause. "Everyone's got one, right? That person. Like you're attached by a piece of elastic, and you spend your time pushing each other away and then you come back together, snap. And years later, you're still thinking about it."

"Liam Payne, getting all deep of a morning."

Liam laughed at that. "Sometimes you come back together when you least expect it," he said. He sounded wistful, even. 

Louis looked down at his hands. Everything seemed the same; his limbs were just where he left them, and his heart was still in the same place. It just felt different. Liam wasn't talking about them; _Make My Day_ wasn't about Liam and Louis. The two of them hadn't thrived on fighting, not like the couple in Liam's song. They'd bickered a lot, and snogged a lot afterwards, time and time again, but they'd never got off on the fight. But the elastic part might be. The two of them. The wistful note in Liam's voice. 

That felt like him. That felt like _them_. 

He listened to Liam's song on the radio, and then when Nick came back on, and Liam had gone, he turned the radio off and went for a shower. 

~*~

He'd got himself set up at the kitchen table when he got a text back from Liam. He'd covered the table with his papers and his laptop, and got Skype all set up on Liam's Wi-Fi so that he could see Niall working. His phone chimed and Niall looked up. 

"Don't look at that," he said. "We're not having a break for another ten minutes."

"Rules don't apply until Zayn's up and working too," Louis said, itching to reach for his phone. "If Zayn's still asleep then I'm checking my phone."

"Fine," Niall said, rolling his eyes. "I'm going to go and wake him up. Fucking coursework, honestly."

"I know," Louis said, but he wasn't concentrating on Niall wandering off to wake Zayn up. He was concentrating on his phone instead, at the text from Liam. _Shame :( was gonna make you peach curry 2nite !!!!! loll lol what do u fancy instead? Taek away? Xxxx_

And Louis could get used to this, he really could, and that was the worst thing about this. He was going to get so fucking hurt. He wasn't sure his heart could take a second breaking. 

_Take away_ , he texted back. _Fancy a chinese if I pick one up? Xxxx_

He didn't wait for a reply, shoving it on vibrate and pushing it down the table. He had a degree to finish, and a teaching qualification ready and waiting for him. He was going to be someone his family could be proud of. He was going to be someone Liam could be proud of. He _was_. 

~*~

He wandered down the road just after _Emmerdale_ started on the telly, going to the shop to get them a Chinese. Liam was just finishing up his last meeting, his text message saying he'd be on his way home in ten minutes, so Louis took advantage of that to go and get them some food. Liam had bought all the food last night, so Louis went all out, getting them spring rolls, prawn crackers, special fried rice, sweet and sour pork, beef in black bean sauce, and chicken with ginger and spring onion. It cost way more than the takeaway near his house, but he swallowed the cost and went next door to the off licence to get them some beer whilst he waited for his food. Four bottles of Tiger set him back way too fucking much, but whatever. 

It felt important, being here. He didn't want to think about what it all meant, but if this was the only time he got to spend with Liam, then he wanted it to be the best. He could pay off his student loan for the rest of his known existence; it shouldn't impact tonight. 

Liam was waiting for him when he got home, fresh out of the shower. 

"I thought you'd gone," Liam said, leaning over the kitchen counter in just his towel. "But then I saw all your stuff was still here."

"I went to get us food," Louis said, depositing three carrier bags down onto the counter, in amongst all the detritus left over from his coursework day. When he'd opened the fridge earlier, there had been a note on the pile of ham and meat and salad that just said, _I don't know if subway Italian bmt are still ur fave but you can make yourself one out of all of this xxxxx_ and he'd ended up eating half a stuffed French stick for his lunch. All the stuff was still littered across the counters. "I left you a note."

Liam pushed a scrap of Louis's notepaper over the counter. "This one?"

Louis nodded. _Gone to get us dinner. Hope you had a good day xx._ "Yep. That one."

"I did have a good day," Liam said. "I got to pick out my favourite merch designs for the merch stalls."

"I didn't realise that was a thing people did," Louis said, getting out foil cartons and lining them up along the counter. "Go and get dressed, you. Can't have a takeaway if you're only wearing a towel." He tried not to think about Liam naked under his towel; it was hard enough when he was just there, still damp, his hair slicked back, broad shoulders and defined abs. 

"All right, all right," Liam said. When he turned around to go back into the bedroom, Louis couldn't stop staring at the line of his spine, the dimples in the small of his back, his towel resting on his hips. 

Louis ducked his gaze and concentrated on trying to figure out what was in each container. 

He'd set the table by the time Liam came out of the bathroom, barefoot and in tracksuit bottoms and a t-shirt. He was pulling on a hoodie, an old faded one that Louis remembered. It had been huge on Liam when they'd been together. Now it was stretched across his shoulders, faded and well-worn. 

"You've had that a long time."

"Yeah," Liam said, without looking down. He smiled. "What did you think of the radio thing this morning?"

"Weird," Louis said, bringing over each of the foil trays to the table, a spoon stuck haphazardly in each of them. "Not you, weird. Just, like. It's weird that you're this famous person that exists in real life too, you know? Like, I'm trying to make this connection in my head. Because you're famous. I've never known anyone famous before. You were on Radio 1 this morning."

Liam hovered by the end of the table, one hand to the back of the chair. "I'm just the same as I always was, you know. Being famous is just, you know—" he stopped. "Harry says that people call you famous like it's a thing that you are, like being good or nice or something, but it's not. It's a thing people call you. It doesn't change who you are inside."

"All right." Louis didn't have an answer for that. Being famous was something that happened to celebrities, whose lives got played out in magazines and on the TV and radio; it didn't happen to real people, who still had to do the washing up and go to the shops and get up early when the alarm went off and they were knackered. The fact that it had happened to Liam, and that Liam was here in front of him—it kind of felt like a dream. The very, very strange kind. "Come on, the food will get cold."

"You do get it, right?" Liam asked, a little quietly. "You know I'm more than just, well—that."

Louis glanced at him. "I know," he said. "The food, though."

Liam sat down carefully, and pulled in his chair. Under the table, his knee knocked into Louis's as Louis sat down, and he didn't pull away. 

Neither did Louis. 

They ate their way through most of the food, dipping prawn crackers into the sweet and sour sauce and listening to them crackle. They didn't hurry, and one beer each turned into two beers, and then Louis sat back down and hooked his ankle round Liam's under the table.

Liam's smile, when it was directed at Louis, was bright like the sun. 

Louis didn't mean to lean over and kiss his cheek, but he did it anyway, sitting back down with a bump. 

"Lou—"

"Thanks for letting me stay," Louis said, cutting Liam off from whatever he was going to say. They had to be on the same page; the two of them were skating on thin ice with everything that they were doing, and it was obvious that they both clearly knew that they were going to get hurt when this ended. There was just this strange kind of desperate pull between them, the same as there always had been: the stretch of elastic that had twisted taut between their hearts for so long shortening until the two of them were caught like this, so close and yet so far. 

Liam didn't smile, but his mouth twisted a little in a pretence at one. "I couldn't leave and come home," he said. "Not without you."

"We just needed a bit more time, yeah?" Louis said. "For us to get everything sorted."

It was a lie. It was a huge fucking lie. Louis was breaking his own fucking heart sitting here, foot bumping up against Liam's under the table. It was reflected in Liam's face too, his smile sad at the edges. 

"Let me take you out for dinner tomorrow night," Liam said. "Somewhere nice."

"What if someone sees?"

Liam shook his head. "It doesn't matter," he said. "It really doesn't. I want to take you out."

Louis knew what Zayn and Niall would say; saying yes was a one-way ticket to getting hurt again. He was still going home the day after tomorrow. After the weekend, he'd be back in lectures and submitting his coursework, and everything would be just the same as it always had been. There wasn't a space for Louis in Liam's life, and more importantly, there wasn't a space for Liam in Louis's. They'd grown up and grown apart, and whatever there was between them just needed to be put to bed. This needed an ending. They needed to end this, and they needed to do it in the most painless way possible. 

"Please," Liam said. "Please, Lou."

"All right," Louis said. "All right, we'll have dinner."

Liam smiled, and Louis's insides trembled and fractured and broke.

"Eat your dinner," Louis said, dropping his gaze to his plate. His hand shook. "It'll get cold."

~*~

They started watching Niall's _Dogtanian_ DVDs after dinner, sitting at opposite ends of the sofa with a bowl of M &Ms and Maltesers in between them. Louis didn't concentrate too much on the telly, faffing with his phone instead. There were six texts from his mum but he still hadn't told her where he was. 

_I'm at liams,_ he typed finally, in between messaging Niall about _Dogtanian_. _Im ok. Ill call you tomorrow._

He got four in a row back immediately, all of them worried and concerned and questioning. 

He just couldn't, all right, he couldn't. He couldn't. 

Liam's phone rang during the third episode, and he paused the DVD with an apologetic glance at Louis and a mouthed _sorry_ after he couldn't get rid of whoever was calling. Judging by Liam's end of the conversation, it was a change to the plans for the radio interview in the morning or something, and he wandered into the kitchen to take it, jotting something down on the pad by the fridge. He was supposed to be on Capital Radio in the morning; Louis knew that much at least. 

Louis wrapped himself up in the fluffy grey blanket, and slipped out onto the balcony. It was freezing out here, and even colder considering he was only in socks, but he needed the air. He leaned on the railing, and tried to take deep breaths. His eyes burned. He squeezed them shut. This was what he'd wanted for Liam. He'd wanted this. 

He'd just wanted something else too, in secret: for the two of them to work out. 

It was another five minutes before Liam followed him outside. "It's freezing out here," he said, rubbing his arms.

"You didn't think to bring a blanket," Louis said, standing up. "I thought ahead."

"What are you doing out here?" 

Louis shrugged. "Admiring the view," he said. "Nice decorative balls down there."

"Who shoves a pile of stone balls in the middle of a garden?"

"Someone without a sense of humour," Louis said. The tiger in his head was curled up with a blanket in the corner; he was as sad as Louis was. "I wanted this for you, you know."

"Decorative balls?"

"No," Louis said. "This. A nice place to live and a big TV. You on the radio. Everyone knowing how great you are."

Liam nodded. "Yeah," he said. "I know." 

"I don't—I still want this for you. Me standing out here like a fucking idiot wishing things were different—it's all still true. This is what you should have."

"But," Liam said softly. "There's a _but_."

"You're shivering," Louis said, and he opened up his blanket cloak. "Come on."

Liam hesitated for a second before stepping into Louis's arms, and the warmth of the blanket as Louis wrapped his arms around Liam's neck, tucking Liam into the blanket too. Liam still smelled like Old Spice deodorant, just like he always had before. It was all Louis could do not to press his mouth to Liam's jaw; he settled for tucking his cold nose into Liam's neck instead. 

"Who keeps you warm, though?" Liam asked, sliding his hands into the small of Louis's back, pressing even closer. 

"I keep myself warm," Louis said, without moving. "I look after myself. I got myself my degree. I'm okay by myself."

"Okay," Liam said, his voice still soft. He rubbed his cheek against Louis's and pressed a little closer. 

They stayed there, Louis's feet slowly turning to blocks of ice, and Louis concentrated on matching his breathing to Liam's until it didn't feel like his insides were tearing themselves to pieces quite so much anymore. 

"Come to bed," Liam said, after a while. "I've got a hot water bottle."

"I'm not a nan, Liam," Louis said. "I don't need a hot water bottle."

"It's my Dennis the Menace one, though. And your feet are always cold."

Louis didn't want a hot water bottle. He didn't want anything but his husband, this grown up version of the boy he'd fallen in love with when they were still at school, this stupidly kind boy who'd grown up to be successful and popular and everything he hadn't been when they'd been teenagers. His fingers caught in Liam's hoodie. "Don't be nice to me," he said, mouth to Liam's throat. 

"I want to be nice to you, though."

"Please," Louis said, and he didn't mean to sound like he was begging. "I can't."

He didn't mean to kiss him. He didn't mean to press his mouth to Liam's jaw and then his cheek and then the corner of his mouth; he didn't mean for Liam to kiss him back. He didn't mean for any of it. 

Liam slid his hands into Louis's hair and kissed him again. The blanket started to slip down from around their shoulders; Louis tried to keep a hold of it, but Liam shook his head. 

"Come inside," he said, mouth to Louis's cheek. He kept kissing him, all along his jaw, tilting Louis's chin up as he started to walk them back towards the flat. 

And Louis gave up fighting, gave up trying to save himself, gave up holding back. He pushed Liam inside, tripping over the blanket, and they barely got inside before Liam was shoving the door closed and Louis was dropping the blanket to the floor, going up on his toes to cup Liam's face in his hands and pull him in for a kiss. 

Liam's cold hands were sliding under Louis's hoodie, so that Louis shivered and jumped forward and he hissed against Liam's mouth. "Cold," he said, in between kisses.

"I know," Liam said, and rubbed his nose against Louis's. They were in the middle of the living room now, heading for the bedroom, and Louis's heart was thumping with the enormity of it all, of everything he wanted, of everything he needed. "Are we?"

Louis swallowed, nudging Liam backwards. He was already nodding his _yes_. 

Liam took Louis's hand, and pulled him towards the bedroom. 

Louis was taking off his jumper as Liam shut the door behind them; the room was in darkness until Liam clapped and the bedside lamp clicked on. 

"You don't even turn your own lamps on," Louis said, trying to laugh, but he couldn't even manage that. His breath felt like it was caught in his throat. His fingers trembled as he pulled his t-shirt off. 

"They came with the flat," Liam said. He stood by the bed, hands caught in his hoodie. He didn't try to take it off. "They're not mine. They're just fancy lamps."

Louis nodded. He was topless and Liam was still in all his clothes. His feet were freezing. "Are you taking your clothes off?"

"I'm too busy watching you," Liam said. 

Louis tried to smile. "Let me watch you instead. Please, Liam. Please." It had been so long. They'd been so young. Being married to Liam seemed like a million years ago; he couldn't imagine ever being that young or that naïve. He was still that in love, though. He still loved Liam just as much as he did when he'd asked him to marry him. 

Liam took his hoodie off and dropped it on the floor. He followed it with his t-shirt and then his trousers, and his socks, until he was just in his underwear. He had a feather tattooed on the inside of his arm; Louis moved closer, reaching for his arm, and ran his thumb over the ink. 

"I love you," Liam said. "I will always, always love you."

"I know," Louis said. He had loved Liam since practically the first time they'd met; they didn't have to be together for it to be the constant, solid truth in Louis's life. He was the family Louis had chosen, and the bonds that lay between them might stretch and eventually fade with time, but they didn't break. It didn't mean they'd end up together. He kept on stroking his thumb over Liam's feather tattoo. "Will you fuck me? Please."

Liam hissed in a ragged breath. "Babe."

"Please, Liam."

Louis thought Liam might kiss him as hard as he had out in the living room, but he didn't. He cupped Louis's face in his hands, tilting his chin up. Louis wrapped his hands around Liam's wrists, holding him there, and Liam watched him for so long that Louis thought that he wasn't going to go through with it, but then he leaned in and pressed his mouth to Louis's. It had none of the urgency of their kisses a few minutes ago; instead it was slow and sweet, and he kept his hands on Louis's face the whole time, until Louis was desperate for more, willing to beg to be touched, to sprawl across the bed and have Liam fuck him until he cried out his name. 

"Liam—"

"I want to see you naked again," Liam said, mouth touching Louis's. "Want to remember what you look like hard."

 _Same as I always did_ , Louis thought. _Desperate for you_. "I haven't changed."

Liam kissed him again, sliding one hand down to curl in Louis's waistband. "I think we both have."

Louis smiled at that. He couldn't help it. He curled his hands into Liam's hair and went up on his toes as an age-old way of prompting Liam to push his trousers down; Liam kissed him again, a little less obedient this time around. He teased Louis a little, nudging his fingers underneath the waistband, his fingertips pressed to Louis's hips. 

"Stop teasing."

"I'm not teasing," Liam lied. "I just can't believe I get to touch you again."

"You are teasing," Louis said. "And you can touch me as much as you want if you get me naked."

Liam kissed his cheek, and his jaw, and sucked a lovebite into Louis's neck, like they really were teenagers again. "You swear?"

Louis clutched at Liam's arms, his head tipped back. "I swear," he said. He was hard, his dick tenting out his boxers, and he curled his hips up, wanting something, wanting Liam. Needing him.

"God," Liam said, kissing his neck. "God, Louis." His hands were inside Louis's pants now, curving over his arse, and Louis shook with it. 

"I need—" Louis didn't know what he needed. He needed Liam to keep on touching him, to keep on kissing him, to get him the fucking hot water bottle so that his feet didn't feel quite so close to blocks of ice. It was overwhelming, having Liam this close. Having him touch Louis's bum and kiss his neck and being this fucking near. He slid his hands into the small of Liam's back, snapping the waistband of his underwear so that Liam hissed in a breath and nipped his teeth against Louis's neck. 

"I need you," Liam said, and he hooked his fingers into Louis's underwear and pushed them down, helping them over Louis's erection. 

He'd leaked; his pants were damp with it. He shoved his pants down and kicked them off, before helping Liam with his, avoiding touching Liam's dick until they were both completely naked. 

And, oh god, Liam's dick. His body; his everything. Broad shouldered and toned, Louis wanted to touch him everywhere, wanted to slide his hands over the defined planes of his body, feel the flex of his muscles beneath his fingertips. But more than that, he wanted to drop to his knees and take Liam in his mouth and see if he tasted the same as he had the last time they'd done this. He ran his hand over Liam's stomach, leaning in to touch his other hand to Liam's jaw. 

"Let me suck you," he said softly, kissing Liam's cheek. "Want to see how you taste."

Liam hissed in a breath, and cupped Louis's face in his hands before pulling him in for another kiss. 

"Okay?" Louis asked, and Liam nodded, tilting forwards so that his forehead was touching Louis's. 

"Yeah," he said. "Suck me off."

Louis went down on his knees, and splayed his fingers over Liam's thighs, over the muscle there, the strength. He'd always been fit, but this was different. He also very clearly manscaped. Louis raised an eyebrow, brushing his thumb over Liam's neatly trimmed pubes. 

"I like to take care of myself," Liam said, and to Louis's gratification, Liam went a bit pink, his hips straining forward a little. "Please, Lou."

Liam's dick had always been a little thinner than Louis's, and a little longer. When they'd compared, back in the day, Louis's had felt a little short and squat in comparison, but Liam had always seemed to like it. He licked his lips, and wrapped his fist around the base of Liam's dick, trying to ignore Liam's hissed intake of breath as Louis pressed the flat of his tongue to Liam's slit, catching the taste of him and keeping it. 

"Babe." Liam sounded ragged already. He slid a hand into Louis's hair, and Louis licked at him again, trying to catch the wet against his tongue. Then he took Liam in his mouth and breathed through his nose, holding him still. "God, just—move, please. Please."

It had been so fucking long. So long. He'd thought it would be like riding a bike; every memory of what Liam liked and how to bring him off would just come back, like picking out chopsticks on the piano, but Liam didn't taste how Louis remembered. His shower gel was different and his pubes were fucking trimmed—Louis was way too lazy to ever consider doing anything with his that wasn't just leaving them exactly how they were—and Liam felt different beneath his hands, but none of that mattered. None of it mattered at all, because it was Liam—Liam was breathless above him, and Louis loved him. He loved him, and he'd missed him, and he moved his hand in time with his mouth and sucked Liam off, feeling him tremble beneath his fingertips. 

He sucked him until Liam's fingers caught in his hair, nudging him off, and Louis sat back on his heels, a string of saliva stretched between his lips and Liam's dick. He wiped his mouth. 

"I want to come inside you," Liam told him, stroking his thumb over Louis's spit-slick bottom lip. He bent down and kissed the corner of Louis's mouth, even though he'd be able to taste himself on Louis's lips, and then stroked a hand through Louis's hair. "Fucking you. Feeling you."

Louis's dick twitched. He was so hard already, leaking. He reached down and wrapped his hand around himself, pulling himself off a little, just enough to satisfy. 

"No," Liam said, sliding his hand around Louis's elbow. "I want to be the one to make you come." He urged Louis up onto his feet, and then kissed him again. 

Louis kissed him back, even though all Liam could probably taste was dick. He wrapped his arms around Liam's neck and kissed him over and over, until he was breathless and panting and his dick was leaving little wet stripes on Liam's stomach. 

"Fuck me," he said finally, because Liam had always loved to kiss, and Louis loved to kiss him back. But he'd waited too long. He wanted Liam inside of him, just this one last time, just the two of them together, a final goodbye to what they'd had before. 

Because it didn't matter how much Louis wanted it; they couldn't fit into each other's lives, not now. There just wasn't the space. And trying to rekindle something they'd felt when they were teenagers now they were adults was a dream. A nice one, but a dream nevertheless. The reality would be nothing like tonight. 

Louis pulled away, and went over to the bed to pull back the duvet, before climbing into bed, tucking his cold toes under the shoved aside duvet, and smiling up at Liam. 

It felt a little sad, his smile. The tiger in his head was still curled up under his blanket. 

Liam crawled onto the bed and slid his hands into Louis's hair. "You're so hot," he said, kissing Louis's temple, his cheek, the corner of his mouth. "I always thought you were the hottest guy I've ever seen in my whole entire life."

"Flatterer," Louis said, but it caught in his chest, because Liam was always genuine, through and through. He didn't have it in him to be anything else. "David Beckham's hotter than me, for a start. Not much, obviously, but a bit."

"Nah," Liam said, stroking one hand down Louis's side, his arm across Louis's stomach. "It was always you for me."

Louis touched his face. "We were good, weren't we? Back then."

Liam nodded. "Yeah," he said softly. "We were the best."

"I'm not sorry I did it," Louis said. "I know I should be, but you've got this flat, and your tour, and your album and everything. I wish you'd never got hurt, though."

"I wish you'd never got hurt. And I still wish you hadn't done it. What if I'd never made it? You'd have broken us up for no good reason."

"You were always the best part of me," Louis told him. It was the truth. Liam had always been the kind one, the earnest and honest part of Louis, the trier. "Staying married to me would have been your only adventure."

Liam looked desperately sad. He kept stroking Louis's stomach with his fingertips. "Don't ever do anything like that to me ever again," he said. "I mean it. You never, ever, ever get to make decisions that affect my future without discussing them with me. I can't—" He stumbled over his words. "I know how brave you were. I know how you were doing it for what you thought was the best. I know you thought I wouldn't ever make it if we were married, but I might have, and you didn't give it a chance—"

"The guy from Sony came to see me, you know? That day you went in to see them. He told me there was no way you'd get signed if you had a husband waiting in reception. And he was right."

"Christ," Liam said, sitting back. "Why didn't you ever tell me?"

"Because you had your dreams, and the only thing standing between you and them was me. So I did what I had to do."

"It's illegal to discriminate against someone if they're gay and married. It's a protected characteristic. It's the law."

"God. How do you know that?"

"Because I'm married to a guy," Liam said, "even if no one knows about it. And because sometimes I want to know what the fuck I'm talking about."

"Liam—"

"I just know it, all right? They should try giving us shit now. I've got fucking lawyers, you know."

"Liam."

"You made a choice," Liam said. "You thought you were doing the right thing and you weren't, but I still ended up with all of this. And I know how brave you were, but that doesn't make it okay. It doesn't make losing you all right. It doesn't make the fact that I had to do this by myself all right." 

"I'm sorry," Louis said, and he didn't know what he was apologising for. Not for Liam being famous, but for everything else, maybe. He scrubbed at his eyes. "I'm sorry."

"Don't cry," Liam said. "I hate it when you cry."

Louis hid his face in his hands so Liam wouldn't see. 

"You were so brave," Liam said again, closer this time, and Louis rolled onto his side, facing away from Liam, so that he wouldn't have to see him cry. "Don't cry, babe."

Louis couldn't help it. He drew his knees up to his chest and tried to hide his face in Liam's pillow. In response, Liam tucked himself around Louis, pressing himself to Louis's back, his arm around Louis's waist. He kissed Louis's throat. 

"I didn't have you for so long," Liam told him, his kiss pressed to Louis's cheek. "I wanted you here."

"I missed you," Louis said. "I'm sorry I hurt you. I'm so sorry I hurt you."

Liam held him tighter, tucking himself even closer in to Louis's back. "You're forgiven," he said, mouth to Louis's skin. "I don't want to keep going over this. I can't. You can't either. It's going to tear us to pieces."

"I didn't stop loving you. It was a lie." Louis knew Liam knew this by now, but he couldn't help saying it again.

"You're forgiven," Liam said again. He kept running his thumb over Louis's stomach, and Louis trembled beneath his touch, trying to get himself under control. Liam kissed his shoulder, but didn't move away, staying pressed close.

"I wish things were different," Louis said, wiping his eyes on the back of his hand.

"What, that I wasn't a singer?"

"And I wasn't about to be a teacher, I don't know. No, not that. I want to be a teacher. Those things can be the same."

"Then what?" His hand was still stroking Louis's stomach, edging closer and closer to Louis's half-hard dick. Louis could feel Liam's dick pressed against his arse. 

"Dunno," Louis said. "That we were both in the same place, I don't know."

"We are in the same place," Liam said softly, sneaking his hand up to play with one of Louis's nipples. Louis's breath caught. Only Liam had ever figured out just how much he liked his nipples played with. 

"I mean—I mean more than just now."

"I know," Liam said. "But right now we're in the same place." He kept touching Louis's nipples, and Louis couldn't help but react, rocking into Liam's touch, biting his lip. "Let's make the most of it." He ducked his head and mouthed at Louis's throat again, nipping at him with his teeth. 

Louis let out a long, ragged breath, and reached behind him, puling Liam closer with one hand to his hip. "You said you'd fuck me," he said, hand to Liam's thigh.

"I did," Liam agreed, still pinching at Louis's nipples. "Do you still want to?"

Louis nodded, pressing back against Liam's dick. "So much."

Liam kissed him again, tilting Louis's head back so that Louis whined against Liam's mouth. With his other hand, he stopped playing with Louis's nipples and stroked his fingers over Louis's dick instead. Louis, returning with gusto from his half-hard state to something resembling really, incredibly hard, rocked his hips up into Liam's touch. 

"I always loved how responsive you were," Liam told him, as he slid his fingers even further down, over Louis's balls until they were skimming over Louis's hole and Louis was whimpering. 

"Yeah, well," Louis managed, as Liam shifted his angle, taking his hand away and coming back from the opposite angle, this time with lube. As Liam stroked him, not sneaking his fingers inside of Louis even though Louis begged him to, pushing back against him with breathless whimpers, he anchored Louis close with one hand across his chest. 

"Slowly," Liam said, circling Louis's hole. "We've waited long enough."

Louis didn't want to wait any longer. He wanted Liam inside of him. "Slow's rubbish," he said. 

Liam laughed, hiding his face in Louis's shoulder. "Fine," he said, and he slipped the tip of his finger inside of him, and the noise Louis made came from deep down inside of him, unprompted and raw. 

Liam wasn't laughing anymore. He crooked his finger inside of Louis, and Louis wanted to sob with it, at everything. He'd bet on Liam, and Liam had won, but it had left Louis alone. He loved his life, but he hadn't realised how big a gap he'd been left after Liam had gone, and how much he'd struggled to keep it hidden behind a guard-tiger and silence. 

"Lou—"

"Don't stop," Louis said, trying to push down onto Liam's finger. "Please don't stop. Don't stop." He already sounded like he was on the edge, but he could feel the walls inside of him starting to crack and tear themselves down, and he needed. He _needed_. 

"I won't," Liam told him, his other hand splayed across Louis's hip. "I've got you."

The sound Louis made sounded a lot like a sob, and Liam covered Louis's body with his own and kissed him, catching all of Louis's desperate need against his lips. He kept on touching Louis even as they kissed, shifting their positions so that he could finger Louis open, a second finger joining the first as Louis struggled to keep himself together. 

But Liam kept on kissing him, even as Louis fell to pieces beneath him, even as his defences crumbled and he clung to Liam like a port in a storm. 

"Fuck me," Louis begged, after Liam had added a third finger and hitched Louis's leg over his. "Please."

"You're so tight," Liam said, still kissing him. 

His dick was leaking against Louis's hip; Louis had forgotten how wet Liam got. One of those things that had slipped from his memory over the past few years, a little thing that had seeped away like water through sand. What else had he forgotten? "I don't care. I just want you inside."

"Christ," Liam said. For a moment, he hid his face in Louis's shoulder, his breath heated and fast against Louis's skin. "Yeah. Yes." He reached past Louis for a condom, and neither of them mentioned how they'd used to do it without one. They'd been young, and in love, and they'd wanted it all. 

Louis watched him put the condom on, watched him slide it down his dick and wrap his fist around it, a couple of twists for good measure. There was a lot he wanted to say, but he didn't know how to say any of it. He reached for Liam instead, sliding his hand around Liam's wrist and bringing it up to his lips so he could press his mouth to Liam's feather tattoo. 

They didn't say anything. Liam kissed Louis's shoulder, nudging him back down onto the pillows, then he knelt between Louis's legs, Louis wrapping his legs around Liam's waist to anchor him into position. Liam's dick was a blunt pressure against his hole. 

When he slid inside of him—slowly and gently, like Louis was something fragile, something to be careful with—Louis laced his fingers with Liam's, and held on. 

"I'd always have picked you," Liam said, once he was inside of him, and still. "You knew that."

"Yeah," Louis said, and his voice caught. Liam was inside of him, and it was the last time. "I knew that."

"You always thought I was worth something."

"I didn't think it, I knew it." 

Liam tried to smile at that. "Thank you," he said. He was trembling, and Louis couldn't help but clench around him, so that Liam gasped out a breath and held on. "For what you gave up."

"I bet on you, and you won," Louis said. "Move, Liam. Move, please."

And Liam did. He fucked into him, slower and gentler than the way they'd used to do it, back in the day. But back then, the future had seemed pretty endless, and Louis had been Liam's first, and he'd taught him how to laugh as they did it, energy enough to come over and over again. He couldn't imagine recreating the night of twelve times now. 

Louis hooked his foot around Liam's waist, and tried to clench around him, his hand sweating in Liam's. His orgasm felt like it wasn't far off, but Louis tried to hold out. This last time, he wanted it to last. He didn't want it to end. 

He couldn't hold off forever, though. Sweat slid down his chest, and down Liam's too, over the planes of his stomach, his skin flushed pink from his shoulders to his thighs. Louis hadn't ever been with anyone who'd flushed like that before, and he dragged his blunt nails over Liam's shoulder, because Liam had always loved that, always wanted him to scratch him like that and remind him he was there. 

"You're here," he said, because maybe Liam needed more than the physical reminder. Maybe Louis did too. "God, Liam. Fuck, you're going to make me come."

"I'm not even touching you," Liam said, and fuck, that was right. Louis wasn't wanking off, his dick leaking onto his stomach, flushed a dark red as Liam fucked up into him, gentle even now, when their orgasms were close and their breath caught. "God, come without me touching you, please, Lou, please—"

He was almost there. His thighs ached and he wasn't used to being fucked, and he was always pretty tight at the best of times, but it felt so fucking fantastic, Liam's dick inside of him. Liam covering him like this, broad-shouldered and beautiful and flushed and Louis's husband. His husband. 

"I'm married to you," he said, breathless, sounds he didn't remember making loud in the air around them, the two of them fucking back against the pillows, the duvet hanging off the bed and the stupid quilt already on the floor. 

"I know," Liam said, and he was balls-deep inside of him, and it felt like he was full up, and he had always, always loved that feeling. Liam sliding their cheap, pink plug inside of him, slick with lube, Louis begging for more as Liam teased him with it until he'd taken it all. "God, Lou. _Louis_ , fuck."

Louis was going to come, and he couldn't hold it off any longer. His orgasm hit him like a train, and he came without a hand on him, his come striping his stomach as he shook through it. 

"Fuck," Liam managed, and he was losing it, his rhythm off the beat and desperate, fucking into Louis like this was it. And it _was_ , in a way, it was. An ending. 

"Come in me," Louis begged, hands to Liam's bicep, like if he could just hold him here a bit longer then it would all be okay. "Please, please, Liam—"

And Liam did. He came in him, hips rocking up into him, skin flushed, crying Louis's name as he did. 

Afterwards, when Liam had tied off the condom and dumped it in the bin by the side of the bed, he pulled the covers up over them and curled into Louis's side. 

"Babe," Louis said softly, after a while. His hand was in Liam's hair, but Liam didn't move, his cheek pillowed on Louis's chest, his arm around Louis's waist. 

"Don't," Liam said, equally quietly. "Just let me have this, just for a bit."

Louis didn't cry, but it wasn't because he didn't want to. He stroked his hand through Liam's hair, over and over again, and didn't say a thing. 

~*~

When the alarm went off in the morning, Liam pressed snooze and lay there in the dark. 

Louis, sleepy and sad and in love, rolled over and tucked himself into Liam's side. "I do love you, you know," he said. 

Liam stroked his shoulder. "I know," he said. "I know."

~*~

Niall knew from the first moment Louis turned Skype on. 

"Oh, Lou," he said. "Tell me you didn't."

Louis tried to smile, but he couldn't. "I slept with him."

Niall let out a breath. "How are you doing?"

"It's a goodbye," Louis said. "I know that. I knew that before I came. I don't fit in this fucking house. I don't fit in his life, and he doesn't fit into mine. Cats and dogs don't get married, you know? It never fucking works."

"Donkeys and dragons," Niall said, but he didn't laugh. He just looked desperately sad. "Do you want to come home?"

Louis shook his head. "Not yet. Tomorrow. I just... I want one last night with him, all right? If that's all I've got then I want it."

"You're getting hurt."

"We both are," Louis said. Fuck. "I wish I wasn't so fucking in love with him, you know? I don't know what's wrong with us and why we didn't stop. We've been apart long enough." He ran his fingers through his hair. "I don't want to talk about me and Liam. Is Zayn up?"

"He's in the shower. He's been in there ages. He won't be long."

"Okay. Come on, let's just, I don't know, get this fucking coursework done, all right? I'm not failing now."

"Lou—"

"I'm all right. People break up all the time. Let's just get on with work."

Niall still looked sad. "All right. But you know where we are."

Louis just needed something to concentrate on that wasn't Liam. 

~*~

It took him until after lunch to build up to calling his mum. She'd been texting him during the morning. She'd even rung him, but Louis hadn't answered the phone, and he can't remember the last time he'd screened his mum's calls. 

He knew he had to admit that he'd lied, that he hadn't stopped loving Liam the way he'd pretended for so long, but knowing that and actually doing it were two different things. 

_Call me and let me know you're ok_ , his mum's latest text said. Louis was making a mess of the kitchen, layering ham and salami onto the remains of a baguette, dumping cheese on the top and ignoring the bag of salad that Liam had bought in a hopeful kind of a way. He should know by now that Louis wasn't ever going to add salad by choice. Life was too short to worry about green stuff. 

_I'm ok_ , he texted back, in between bites of his sandwich. 

_Then answer your phone._

He didn't send back, _I'm scared of telling you the truth_ , but he wanted to. Instead, he finished his sandwich, dusted the crumbs onto the kitchen floor, shoved the remains of the ham back in the fridge, and put the kettle on for another cup of tea. He put a teabag into a clean, purple mug—ignoring the three mugs he'd already used that morning—got the milk out of the fridge, and pressed _call_. 

"Louis," his mum said, answering almost immediately. The little ones must be at nursery, she never got to answer the phone first ring if she's had her hands full with the second twins, who were approximately eleven times more mischievous than Louis had ever been. "What on earth is going on?"

"Nothing," he lied.

"Hmm," his mum said. "Where are you? I called the house phone but Niall just said you were away. Away where? And what's this about Liam? Your Liam?"

"Yes, my Liam. Um, like—" he waited for the kettle to finish boiling, and then poured water over his teabag. "I don't know where to start."

"The beginning, maybe?" 

"Aren't you working today?"

"Not until this evening. Night shift rotation again. I feel like the walking dead."

"Nights are the worst."

"They are," she agreed. "But it's only for another fortnight. Doris has decided she doesn't want to go to sleep at night anymore, so at least that joy has passed to Dan for a bit. Now, come on, love. What's got you dodging the phone? It's always surgically attached to you."

"It isn't." He shrugged, giving his tea a good stir. When he scooped out his teabag, he dumped it on the side by the sink. He poured in milk. "I don't know what to say."

"Start by telling me where you are, love."

"I'm at Liam's," he said. "He's got this posh flat in London."

There was a pause. "Okay. I didn't know you two kept in touch."

"We didn't. I saw him at a club the night we finished our last teaching block. I was wasted and he was just, I don't know, there."

"Then what?"

Louis shrugged. "He came to my house and he figured out I'd lied to him. Then he left. Then he came back. Then he left again."

"Louis—"

"I'm in love with him, Mum. I love him."

"Again?" 

Louis shook his head. "No," he said finally. "It's the same as it was. I always loved him. I just kept on loving him. I tried and tried not to. I tried so hard not to."

"I don't understand. Louis, will you just start making some kind of sense?"

Louis squeezed his eyes shut. "I never stopped loving him, Mum. I lied. I told him I didn't so he'd go."

His mum made a soft, bitten-off sound at that, and Louis poked at his mug with his finger. 

"I knew he wouldn't get famous if he had me hanging round. No one wanted to sign some gay teenager with a husband. I had to do it."

"Do what?"

"Make him go," Louis said, and his chest hurt just thinking about it. "Make him think we couldn't be married anymore. He wouldn't ever have gone otherwise. And he was so good, Mum. You know how good he was. I was holding him back."

"You lied to me," she said carefully. "You lied to everyone."

"Yeah," he said. "Sorry."

"All this time, and you never told me."

"I didn't tell anyone. I just got used to, I don't know, not talking about him. Pretending."

He took his cup of tea over to the sofa, and curled up in the corner of it, pulling the blanket over his knees. 

"Mum?"

"I don't know what to say. I didn't think you'd be able to tell me anything that shocked me, but this does. All this time, Louis."

"It broke my heart," Louis said softly, after a minute. "It hurt so much. And I couldn't tell anyone."

"God. And what's going on now?"

"I don’t know. I'm here. We're just trying to finish things, I think. He's taking me out tonight."

"Doesn't sound like finishing it to me."

"Doesn't matter either way though, does it?" He shrugged. "I'm a student teacher and he's a pop star. We don't fit anymore."

"Do you want to?" his mum asked. "Fit?"

"I've tried not to love him. I've tried and tried and it won't go away. But it doesn't matter. Can you imagine him having to talk about me in those magazines the girls used to get? All those questions about what do you look for in a girl? And he'll have to say me. Some crap no-hoper who's taken forever to get his life in order. He can't have me on his arm when he shows up for the Brits, can he?"

"Why not?" She sounded sharp. "What's so wrong with being with you? You're great."

"You're obligated to say that, cos you're my mum. And it's okay, you know, I'm happy being a teacher. This is what I want to do. He wants to be a pop star and I want to do this."

His mum sighed. "What does Liam want?"

"I don't know. Like, me? Maybe. But if it's an either or then he should get the career. Right?"

"I can't take any of this in. I thought you and Liam were over years ago."

"Maybe we were. I don't know. I just, like—" Louis stopped. "I just want it. These few days. An end, I don't know. I slept with him."

"None of this sounds good. It sounds like you're going to get hurt."

"I'm already hurt. It's okay. I've done it before."

"Love."

"Don't," Louis said. "Please don't. I know it's a stupid idea, all right. I know it. It's just a few days, though. I get him for a few days and then I'll just figure out a way to actually get over him. It'll be fine." If he just sounded like it would be, then maybe she'd believe him. 

"You hid this from me for years."

"I know. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I just—" he stopped. "I was doing the right thing and I wanted it to be over. I wanted to stop loving him, but it never happened. I'm so sorry I didn't tell you."

"I'm just worried about you."

"What if he was thinking about coming out?"

"That's long overdue."

"You don't think it would be brave?"

She sighed. "I don't know. I don't know what I'm feeling. I can't get over how long you've been lying."

Louis tried not to cry. "I'm sorry. Mum, I'm sorry. Are you angry at me?"

"I don't know." That didn't make his heart hurt any the less. "I suppose. I'm hurt. I thought you could trust me. But you didn't, and you went though all of this by yourself. I'm your mum, Lou. I thought you knew that meant I was always going to be on your side."

"I know you never wanted me to get married that young."

"I didn't want you to put all your eggs in one basket. Liam was a lovely boy, but he was so young. You were both so young."

"You had me young. Do you regret that?"

"No. You were my adventure, Lou. I just wanted you to have all the adventures life could throw at you. I just—I didn't think that that included getting married when you were still so young."

"I loved him so much."

"I know." There was a long pause. "I love you, you know."

"I know. I love you too."

"When do you go home?"

Louis smiled at that. It hurt. Home meant leaving Liam behind. It meant leaving his marriage behind, because there was nothing in his head that could fathom melding their lives together in any meaningful way. Dreaming wasn't enough to make it work. It had to be something real, something tangible, something more than the two of them hoping it would work. "Don't know. Tomorrow, maybe."

"Why don't you come here for the weekend? Ernest and the others would like to see you. Maybe it'll take your mind off it all. We can talk about it. See if we can't look after you for a few days."

"Maybe. I'm sorry I lied."

"I'm sorry you did, too. I wish you could have trusted me."

Louis rubbed his forehead. Everything was so confusing in his head. He just wanted everything to be less complicated. "I did trust you. I just wanted to do the right thing. Half the time I think I did, the other half I absolutely get why you and Liam are angry about it."

"You're not letting all that uni work pile up, are you?"

"I'm doing it now. Liam's at work. Don't worry. I'm not messing anything up."

"Good. You've worked so hard. We're all so incredibly proud of you."

"Mum—"

"So proud. All your hard work. You're so close to being done."

"I know." There was a big pile of his papers spread across Liam's table. He needed to get back to it, get as much of it done as possible before his dinner with Liam. "It's not that—" he stopped. "I'm not doing this because of Liam, you know? I'm not doing any of it because of him. But I want to be better because of him. He believed in me when I was nothing, Mum, and I want to be worthy of that. I don't know how to, like, say that without sounding like a knob. He makes me want to be better. He always made me want to be better. He never accepted I was just a failure."

"I never accepted that either."

"I know. I know that. I don't know what I'm saying." He let out a breath. "I'll call you about this weekend, all right? It depends on my coursework. And when I leave here."

"Don't throw it away," his mum said. "You're so close."

"I know. I won't."

"I love you. I have to go and pick the kids up from playgroup."

"All right," Louis said. "I'm sorry. I never meant to lie. I just had to."

"Liam's a good boy," his mum said. "He was always good to you. He always looked after you."

"He's still the same. He's the same as he always was. He's good to me now."

"Not everyone's like that, you know."

"I know." 

"Be careful. You've always given your heart away pretty easily."

"Not really," Louis said. "Liam's had it since he was sixteen."

His mum laughed at that. It sounded sad. "Good luck with the coursework. Everyone here loves you."

"Yeah," Louis said, and when he hung up, he stayed under the blankets for a few minutes, his tea in hand, and wished things were different. 

~*~

Louis put his coursework away when it got to five in the afternoon, closing down his laptop at the same time. Liam would be getting home at six-ish, and then the two of them were going out for dinner, and Louis definitely, definitely needed some time to prepare before that. 

He spent a good half hour in the shower, letting the hot water ease away some of the tension in his shoulders, using Liam's shampoo and shower gel so that he could smell like Liam. When he got out, Liam was sitting on the bed, playing with his phone. 

"You gave me a heart attack," Louis said, clutching the knot of his towel. "I thought you were a burglar or something."

"Burglars often sit around and wait for people to get out of the shower."

Louis rolled his eyes. "You're early, aren't you?"

"Couldn't wait to get away today," Liam said. "I've booked us a table for tonight. You're still up for it, aren't you?"

"Even showered in preparation."

Liam smiled. It looked a little tired at the edges. "Okay. I'll go and shower too."

When he walked by Louis, he cupped Louis's face in his hand and kissed the corner of his mouth. "Hi."

"Hi," Louis said.

Liam smiled again. "Missed you."

"Yeah. Missed you too."

This was a terrible idea.

~*~

"Is this a posh taxi, or what?" Louis asked, settling back into his seat. It didn't say cab anywhere on it, and there wasn't a meter anywhere he could see. This was the high life.

"Car company," Liam said, one arm along the back of the seat. Louis tried not to look at him; Liam had really dressed up, even wearing a black tie under his leather jacket, and black trousers instead of jeans. His shoes shone. He looked like David Beckham. He looked rich. "We use them for work but I set up a personal account too."

"No driving round on the record company's money, then."

Liam shook his head. "You look nice, by the way."

Louis grinned. "It's the quiff, isn't it?" He'd spent ages fucking with his hair, getting the quiff to look like a fucking pompadour. He was wearing his smartest jacket too, except his had been in the sale at Topman, and looked a bit creased from being in his bag. He'd felt like a knob in his buttoned-up shirt, so at the last minute he'd swapped it for a black t-shirt instead, rolling his trousers up a little at the bottom and going without socks. "And my graduation shoes." He tapped his toes together, black shiny brogues. He loved Topman, when he could afford it.

"Well, if you're wearing your graduation shoes."

"I am," Louis said. "And you look like David Beckham." He didn't mention he'd had fantasies where Liam had looked like this. He glanced down at his jacket. "Glad you think I scrub up okay. You think I'll be posh enough for where we're going? I don't have anything posh."

"No," Liam said. "You're good. You look great."

Louis tried to smile, and when that was too hard, he looked out of the window instead, at the shops as they drove by. Everyone living their lives, not realising that there was a pop star driving by. But maybe they were used to it. Louis had no idea which bit of London they were in, but they were driving past Mulberry and Giorgio Armani. Maybe a pop star wasn't anything to be bothered by round here. 

They pulled into a side street, which didn't look all that impressive considering the area, and came to a stop by an estate agents. Louis was half convinced Liam was going to run around the car and open the door for him, so once the car had come to a standstill, he climbed out, straightening his jacket, awkward and unsure. He didn't know how to do fancy dates in London. He didn't know how to be this person for Liam, even for one night. 

Liam reached for Louis's hand, but Louis pulled away. "People will see," he said, even though the street was pretty quiet. 

"No," Liam shook his head. "I'm not doing this anymore. I'm not hiding who I am." He smiled. "I've decided. I'm going to tell the truth about who I am. Who I like. No more hiding or lying."

Louis's heart felt like it was stuttering to a stop. "Liam—"

"I'm proud of being bisexual," Liam said. "I really am. I'm not having some stupid record company guy saying who is and who isn't allowed to sing because of who they fancy, that's ridiculous."

"And you're never ridiculous."

"No," Liam said. "Sometimes I am." He held out his hand. "No one's around, Lou. I'm going to make a statement, but this isn't it. This is just me wanting to hold your hand."

Louis waited a moment, then reached for Liam's hand. "All right." His heart pounded. Maybe it was just this stupid quiet street, tucked away from the hustle and bustle of London life, but maybe just this once there was a space for the two of them. 

The restaurant didn't look all that exciting from the outside, just a dark little shop front down a side street, but inside it was opulent and exciting, the two of them having a table at the back, away from the rows of identical tables down the centre of the room. 

"This looks posh," Louis said, as they were shown to their seats, and he could only remember what it felt like to have Liam's hand in his. He glanced at the menu. "It actually sells caviar. Different kinds of caviar." Up until this moment, he hadn't really considered the possibility of varieties. "Do you think imperial caviar thinks a lot of itself?"

"Probably," Liam said. "I thought you'd like the steak, though."

"There's steak?" He felt uneasy and out of place, like the menu was out of his reach. He'd never been to a place like this. He was more of a Bella Pasta or a Nando's kind of a boy.

Liam reached over and bumped his hand into Louis's. "I wanted to take you somewhere nice. You still like steak, right?"

"Love it," Louis said, whose forays into the world of steak tended to be when the frying steak was reduced in Tesco. "What's the difference between all the kinds?"

"No idea," Liam said. "I've heard of rib-eye, though. I might get that."

"It's thirty pounds. You could buy a cow for that." The cheapest one was a D-rump. He had literally no idea what that was, but he should probably order that one. 

"How much do cows sell for, anyway?"

"No idea. Do you seriously not get chips with it?" Chips were an extra four quid. God. If he needed any real evidence for why he couldn't ever really fit into Liam's life, then this was it. 

"Babe. Stop looking at the prices. This is my treat. Steak and chips and frozen vodka."

"It's so expensive," Louis said, looking down at the menu. He felt stupid asking, but he couldn't help it. "Are you sure you can afford this? I've got a bit of money, but I could pay you back."

Liam looked sad. "We could go somewhere else. I just wanted to do something really nice. You don't have to pay for it. It's on me."

Louis concentrated on his menu. "Are you going to make me eat salt-baked beetroot as a starter?"

"Uh, no." 

"Liam—"

"I love you," Liam said softly. "I'm in love with you. I don't want you to go."

"I've got to. Look at this place. I don't fit in. I don't fit in with any of it."

"But you love me, right? You love me."

Louis didn't want to cry. He was all dressed up in his finest, out with his husband, and it still felt like an ending. "Course I do." 

"Do you want a divorce?"

"Do you?"

Liam shook his head. "No."

"We've been split up for years. Surely we should want a divorce."

"I don't," Liam said. "I never did."

The waitress was coming over for their drinks orders; Louis hadn't even looked at the menu. Fucking hell, one of the bottles of wine was six and a half grand. He picked a cocktail at random; fifty pence went to a charity promoting education and football with one of them, so he went with that. His head swam. His jacket felt uncomfortable and his hair felt stupid and Liam looked like fucking David Beckham, and Louis loved him. He loved him. 

"You don't meet your soulmate when you're seventeen," Louis said softly, once the waitress was walking way. 

Liam looked at him. "Don't you? I'm pretty sure I did."

"I've done fine without you."

"I know. I've done all right without you too. I don't want to be with you because of any of that. You make my life better. You always have."

"I don't want to talk about this right now," Louis said, because he was so close to crying he didn't know what to do with himself. "Please, Liam. Can we talk about something else?"

Liam waited a moment before nodding. "All right. Do you want to try the rib-eye too?"

"Okay." Louis couldn't think straight. The tiger in his head was doing a fucking shit job of looking after him; all Louis could do was keep remembering the him and Liam together before, all cheap clothes and a shit flat and a bed they spent most of their time in. They'd been stupidly young and stupidly in love, and that had been what was important—the two of them together. He let Liam order for him, fiddling with his napkin as the waitress tried not to ask Liam for his autograph. This wasn't him; he'd always been too loud and too bright and act first, think later. _Never amount to anything_. A fuck up who'd got through one thing after another on the strength of his charm and a bit of quick talking. 

That was who Liam had loved. That was who he'd idolised. Louis put down his napkin. 

"Are you really going to come out?"

Liam shrugged a little, his shoulders going up. There was a tiny patch on his jaw he'd missed when he'd shaved; Louis wanted to reach out and press his thumb to it. "I think so," he said, clasping his hands together and resting his chin on them. "I want to be, like, me." 

"You don't have to, you know."

"I know. But people would find out at some point."

"Cos of me?"

Liam shrugged again. "Maybe. Maybe not." He stopped. "I'm trying so hard not to make this about you. But it is. Like, at least in a way. You thought I was worth something. You gave me, like, this huge chance. I want to have it and be me."

"Why, though? You have everything. Why change it?"

"I don't have you."

Louis looked away. "Don't."

"You've been really sad and quiet," Liam said. "And I don't know if it's cos I'm here or if it's something else. I don't want to be the person that makes you sad. I never did. I only ever wanted to be the person who made you happy. I just..." He stopped. "I want to be that person. I want to be that person again. If you'll let me."

"Donkeys and dragons," Louis said. "We're donkeys and dragons."

Liam looked puzzled. "Isn't it dungeons and dragons?"

"No, I mean—it's like Shrek. You can't have a donkey and a dragon in real life. How the fuck did the donkey get the dragon up the duff, anyway? It'd be like wanking in a cave."

"Oh no," Liam said. "Don't ruin my childhood. Stop it."

"Like, that's a really big dragon. And a very small donkey. Don't tell me you've never thought about it."

There was a pause. "Rimming might take a while."

Louis snorted. "God. Liam."

"How come I always end up being the donkey, anyway?"

"You're bigger than me." Louis tried to smile. "I don't think that makes you the donkey."

"There's literally no world in which you're more of a donkey than a dragon. And I don't know what your point is, anyway."

"We don't go together. That's my point."

"You don't want us to? Or you don't think we can? Because they have babies, Lou. They have baby dragons and donkeys. They fit."

"Wanking in a cave," Louis said. Tiny dragon and donkey babies, god. _God_. 

"They love each other," Liam said. "That's the point. They love each other and I think we love each other, and I want us to try, and you need to tell me if you don't want to. Please, Lou. I love you."

"You're rich and famous," Louis said. "You could, like, go out with Ellie Goulding."

"She's got a boyfriend."

"You could go out with Ellie Goulding and Dougie too. They're both hot."

"I've got a husband. I don't want either of them."

"What about, like, Harry Styles? He's really hot."

"He's with Nick. They have a dog at Nick's house and a cat at Harry's."

Louis hadn't known that. "What's the cat called?"

"Turmeric Barthes," Liam said. "Harry named him, obviously. I don't know how to spell either of those words. I only send birthday cards to Pig."

Louis put his face in his hands. The waitress was coming back over with their drinks. He recovered just enough to look like he wasn't about to have a breakdown, and even managed to give her half a smile as he took his drink. The restaurant was getting busier; it had been half full when they arrived but it was starting to fill up. Louis couldn't tell if people were looking at them or not. Maybe this place was too cool to stare at famous people. 

"Louis."

"I love you," Louis said. "But you can't be with me. I'm going to be a teacher. I've got to do stupid parent evenings and teach mouthy year tens about Stanislavski."

"I have no idea what that is."

"Neither will they. I've got to make them do their homework and talk about theatre design. I've got to take A level students to the theatre. You've got to go on Top of the fucking Pops and Radio 1."

"Top of the Pops hasn't been on for years."

Louis made a face. "You live in London. I'm going to be an NQT, fuck knows where."

"It won't work if you don't want it to," Liam said doggedly. "And it's okay if you don't. But if we both want it, we should at least try. Louis, please."

"It's not that I don't want to," Louis said. "It's like—I can't break up with you again. I did it once. It fucking killed me, all right? And I'm scared. I'm scared of who you are, because there isn't a space here for me. Where the fuck do I fit in? You want me to, what, show up with you to the Brits? Jay-Z and Beyonce, and then you and me? Just some sad no-hoper from Doncaster? I don't get where I'm going to go in your life. Like, this imaginary life you're talking about, I don't know where I go. Are you going to come over to mine every Friday night and watch me write lesson plans instead of snorting coke with pop stars in Jacuzzis filled with vodka? Because that's what it's going to be like. Getting drunk with me whilst I try and figure out how to get fourteen year olds to engage with showing conflict on stage. You're selling out arenas. Anyway, shut up, they're bringing over the food."

Liam looked desperately tired, but he obediently kept quiet as they were served their steaks, chips, mash and gravy, and bread and butter. He waited until the waitress was walking away before he bumped his knee into Louis's under the table. "If you haven't got a parents' evening, and if you're not taking sixth formers to the theatre, then yes, I want you to be my date for the Brits."

"Liam, don't joke."

"I'm not. That guy who told you they wouldn't sign me? He's the one who's lost out. I don't think this is the end of the world. It's not like I'd be the only pop star who liked to kiss boys. Will Young's been out for years. Frank Ocean. Sam Smith got all those awards."

"Yeah, but—" It was different for them. 

"I'm coming out anyway. It doesn't matter what your answer is. It doesn't matter if we need to work this stuff out slowly or not at all. Not for this. I'm telling the truth."

Louis poked at his steak with his fork. He cut a little bit off, but didn't put it in his mouth. "Where would we live?"

"I don't know. Where do you want to teach?"

"Wherever they give me a job. Me and Niall and Zayn want to be in the same town, but we don't have to start applying for another few weeks. What are you even saying?"

"I was thinking about buying a place. Somewhere I could buy furniture."

"Liam."

"Are you telling me no?" Liam asked. "Because I'll stop. I don't want to force you into something you don't want. But if it's a maybe, we could talk about this stuff. There's somewhere in the middle, right? We could at least try."

Louis's steak was lovely, but he couldn't enjoy it. "Do you think you can be a gay teacher with a husband?"

"Yeah," Liam said. "Yeah, babe. I think you can."

"What about a pop star husband?"

"Dunno. I don't see why not."

Louis nodded. God. Is he really going to do this? "It's a maybe," he said finally. "But I don't want to talk about it here."

"All right," Liam said. "We'll talk about it later. How's your mum?"

Louis let out a breath, and tried to remember how to breathe. 

~*~

They didn't get a car straight outside the restaurant after they'd finished their meal, by mutual silent agreement. Instead, they wandered along the road side by side, Louis's hands shoved in his pockets. They walked past the Victoria and Albert museum, and then the Natural History Museum, and then when a gaggle of teenagers appeared round the corner in front of them, they ducked into a side street to avoid them.

Liam leaned against someone's railings. 

"Thanks for dinner," Louis said finally, when the silence had got oppressive. He hadn't ever really been quiet in his life, but he was quiet now. It was loud in his head, though. 

"Any time," Liam said. "Sorry if it was a bad idea."

"It wasn't. I'm just..." He stopped. "Sorry. I'm sorry."

"I shouldn't have—not then. It wasn't fair."

Louis shook his head. "Will you kiss me?"

"Lou—"

"Please," Louis said. 

Liam stepped closer, cupped Louis's face in his hands, and touched his mouth to Louis's. "There," he said. 

Louis tilted his chin up. "I knew the last time I kissed you, you know. Before. Back, you know. Before everything. I kissed you and I knew you'd never kiss me again, because I was going to tell you I didn't love you anymore."

"Is this the last time all over again?"

"No," Louis said. "I don't know if I can get a teaching job in London. There aren't that many drama teacher jobs anyway. And I don't know if I even want to live here."

"Fucking southerners," Liam said, in a bad attempt at Louis's accent. He was trying to smile. 

"I wouldn't have any friends. I wouldn't know anyone."

"It doesn't have to be London. I don't need you to give up everything to be near me. There's, like, bound to be a compromise."

"Your work's here."

"Yours might not be." Liam slipped his hand into Louis's. It was cold, but Louis couldn't help but squeeze it. It was so fucking rich round here. High white terraces lined either side of the road they were on, like something out of Mary Poppins or Paddington Bear. Louis couldn't imagine even being able to afford a night in a hotel that looked like one of these buildings, let alone actually living here. It was a different world. 

He tried to grin at Liam. "You look like David Beckham tonight. I always fancied him rotten."

Liam really did smile at that, ducking his head. "I don't, but thanks."

"I fancy you rotten," Louis said impulsively. It felt like the time. "More than David Beckham. Loads more than David Beckham."

"More than the dragon fancies the donkey?"

"Much more," Louis said confidently. He paused. "How big do you think a dragon vag is anyway?"

"Oh god," Liam said. "Stop it."

"I'm just saying. Wanking into a cave."

"No," Liam said, leaning over and clapping his hand over Louis's mouth. "Stop it."

"Make me," Louis said, because he'd spent ninety-seven per cent of his time with Liam over the years trying to make him misbehave, and even now, after so long apart, it came as second nature. He licked Liam's palm.

Liam pushed away from the railings, and backed Louis into a lamppost, hand still over his mouth. "Yeah?"

Louis nipped at him with his teeth. "Yeah," he said, and his heart was pounding. Liam's eyes were searching, probably trying to figure out what the fuck was going on. Louis didn't know either. "Liam, please."

Liam rested his hand over Louis's hip. "You looked really hot tonight."

"Looked?"

"Look." He stroked his thumb over Louis's cheek. "Really, really hot." 

Louis tried to smile. "You too. Do you reckon they've got one of those gardens round here? Like in _Notting Hill_?"

"If we get arrested breaking into a garden—"

"We won't." 

"You always say that," Liam said, but he was already looking up and down the road, like he was looking for a garden they could break into.

"And have we ever been arrested? No. My point stands."

"Fine," Liam said. "Fine, we'll find a garden."

Louis wanted to laugh. He slid his hand into Liam's instead, something like anticipation sneaking across his skin. "We're going on an adventure."

"Yeah," Liam said, "we are."

~*~

Louis's dreams of clambering over wrought iron fences into a secluded gardens like Hugh Grant and Julia Roberts were rather thwarted by the only barrier to their entry being a polite sign that said 'Residents Only' and a flimsy catch that might have been a lock once. 

"You're disappointed," Liam said, after they'd sneaked inside. The garden was surrounded on three sides by tall white terraces with black iron railings, and on the fourth side by a quiet road, the garden hidden from view by well-kept shrubs that crept higher than the railings, to keep the plebs from seeing in. The garden was in darkness, but some of the light from the streetlights crept in over the shrubs and in-between the trees to leave stripes of light across the grass. There was a bench in one corner of the garden that Liam headed straight over to, sitting down on the arm. "I can't believe you're disappointed."

"I'm not disappointed," Louis said. He came over and stood in front of the bench, hands in his pockets.

"You thought we were going to be scaling walls or something." Liam bumped his foot into Louis's. "A couple of James Bonds."

"Didn't," Louis said, but he sort of had. He'd ached for it, something stupid and reckless to take the edge off everything he was feeling, anticipation and desperation and frustration and desire and everything else as well. An answer to a question he didn't even know how to ask, a release he was desperate for but couldn't articulate. 

Liam reached for his hand. "I don't have to live in London," he said finally. "I can just commute in when I need to. You don't have to move somewhere you don't want to. Away from your friends."

"What, you want to move somewhere where you don't know anyone instead? What's fair about that?"

Liam was wearing his most stubborn expression. Louis recognised it of old. "You did it last time. It's my turn."

Moving to Wolverhampton straight after his A levels hadn't exactly been the greatest thing Louis had ever done. "Liam—"

"You took a chance and moved to be with me. It's my turn."

"God," Louis said. "Fuck, Liam."

"We could get a dog," Liam said. "You know. If you wanted. Ruth's pretty much adopted Loki full time. I think the most we could get is part-ownership of him. He loves it at hers. I'd feel bad about taking him away. He's best mates with her dog, they follow each other round all the time. Like ducklings. Except dogs."

"Liam—" 

"I thought you stopped loving me."

"I didn't."

"I know. I want to give this a go. You and me."

Louis bumped the toe of his shoe against the leg of the bench. His heart pounded. "Yeah," he said finally. 

"Yeah?"

This was scarier than breaking into a garden. It was scarier than signing up for a PGCE or walking into a room full of teenagers with a hastily pulled together lesson plan. It was totally fucking terrifying. "All right," he said. "I'm saying yes."

Everything in the garden felt desperately, terrifyingly still. 

The leaves rustled in the breeze, and Louis trembled with it. His hands stayed shoved in his pockets. 

"God. Louis."

Louis reached for him then, his hand finding Liam's in the dark. "I'm shitting myself, you do know that, don't you?"

"You never tell anyone you're scared."

"I tell you." Louis always had. Liam broke all of Louis's rules. That was the problem. 

Liam squeezed his hand. "I don't ever want you to stop."

Being disarmed by Liam's earnestness probably wasn't ever going to go away. It had just been a while, that was all. 

The tiger in Louis's head was curled up in the corner, wrapped in a blanket. Louis rather thought he should be protecting it, not the other way around. He pulled his jacket a little tighter around him. "Can we go home?"

"Yeah," Liam said, and stayed holding Louis's hand whilst they arranged for the car to come and pick them up. 

~*~

They sat on the balcony with a blanket each and a couple of cans of cider, and didn't say much. Louis's hand was laced with Liam's. It was freezing cold but Louis didn't want to go to bed yet, and Liam wasn't going to make him. Liam never made him. They pulled the string on the patio heater that Liam had forgotten he had, and Louis rested his head on Liam's shoulder. 

He didn't mean to doze off. 

~*~

"Thought you were watching the sun rise?" Liam said, a couple of hours later. They'd turned the patio heater off, the bright orange heat having made Louis feel like he had sun burn, and Louis had put off going to bed again under the pretence of watching the new day dawn.

Louis wasn't watching the sun rise. He was watching Liam instead. 

Liam was watching him back. 

They didn't move for the longest time, the sky turning a gentle grey-shade orange with the rising of the sun. 

"What are you going to do?" Louis asked finally. 

Liam shrugged. "Being true is being brave," he said. He got his phone out of his hoodie pocket, and pointed it at Louis. "Or something like that."

"What are you doing?"

"Taking your picture," Liam said. "And then I'm coming out."

Louis looked away. He could feel a muscle trembling in his jaw. He was going to cry. "They'll find out about us," he said eventually, without turning back around. He had, at one time, known how to have a relationship with Liam. He wasn't sure if any of that still held true. He didn't know how to have a secret relationship. Having a secret husband had been hard enough, and that had just been his secret, and nobody else's. 

"I know," Liam said. "Do you mind? If they find out about us?"

"No," he said. His voice shook. It was so fucking cold. "No. I don't mind at all."

Sunrise in winter wasn't anything like sunrise in summer. It was a gradual greyification of the night. There were people waiting at the bus stop down the road, little moving shapes in a queue that grew until the bus pulled up. A Waitrose delivery van went by. Louis didn't turn around. His hands shook, so he shoved them into the pockets of the hoodie he'd pulled on instead of his jacket when they got home. 

Another bus pulled up, and then one behind that. _Three_ , he thought. _Buses always come in threes_. The traffic moved slowly, chugging past the gates to the flats, headlights on. 

"Fuck. It's so cold that my typing's for shit. Everything's spelled wrong."

He sounded breathless. Louis couldn't—he couldn't. "Liam—"

"Please," Liam said. He sounded like he was about to cry. "Don't make me do this alone."

Louis moved then, crossing the balcony and pressing himself to Liam's side, mouth to his cheek. "You're not alone," he said. "You're never alone." 

"Look." Liam shoved his phone at him. "Look."

Louis's hand was shaking so much it took him a moment to be able to see Liam's Tweets, and even longer to realise he should be scrolling up to see them chronologically. 

_**Liam Payne**_ @ _real_liam_payne_  
_so theres something I wanted to tell you all nd I waanted you to hear it from meeee first_

 _ **Liam Payne** _ @ _real_liam_payne_  
_before I was famous I met someone and I fell in love + it was perfect. I always sed in intervews that I hdnt bean in love and that was a lie and im sorrry._

 _ **Liam Payne** _ @ _real_liam_payne_  
_cos wen we broke up I had my heart tottally broken n I swore that I wouudnt gethurt again and I didnt want t think about what id lost_

 _ **Liam Payne** _ @ _real_liam_payne_  
_xcept he was the best thing that ever happpended to me_

 _ **Liam Payne** _ @ _real_liam_payne_  
_and he knew how much I wanted to sing and he thoght that if people knew I was marrried to a guy then I wouldn't make it_

 _ **Liam Payne** _ @ _real_liam_payne_  
_so he gave me up so I cud have my dream and I just found out_

 _ **Liam Payne** _ @ _real_liam_payne_  
_and I know this might mean you dont wont to hear me singgg anymore but I dont wont to lose him again because I love him nd hes worth fighting for_

 _ **Liam Payne** _ @ _real_liam_payne_  
_so im coming out. I love you alllllll and im so greatful for you all for being my fans and I hope you accept me now u know im bisexual ad in love with the best guy on the planet._

 _ **Liam Payne** _ @ _real_liam_payne_  
_I love you all and thanks for everything n sorry for my terrible typing its really cold outside and my hands are freezing but I culdnt loose my nerve_

"Christ," Louis said. "Christ, Liam."

"I love you," Liam said, and he sounded like he was going to cry. "I want to still be married to you more than anything."

Louis shook his head. "I'm not going anywhere," he said. "I think I'll always want to be married to you."

Liam's face crumpled. He buried his face in Louis's neck. "I can't lose you. I didn't know how to keep you, but it's all I want."

Louis still didn't know how this was going to work. He'd never let himself even consider that it could. His stomach was a churning mix of fear and desperate hope. "I don't know either. I don't know."

Liam looked down at his phone again. He went back to his home screen, and then to Instagram, choosing a picture. "Can I?" he asked, showing Louis the screen. It was the picture he'd just taken of him, Louis mostly in shadow in the grey of the early morning light, wrapped up against the cold, just his profile in view. 

"What are you going to say?"

Liam cropped the picture, and then scrolled through the filters. "Don't know," he said. "What's the story, morning glory?"

"Champagne supernova," Louis suggested, his heart pounding. "Wonderwall. I don't know. Something you feel right now."

Liam typed in, _even when the night changes_. It sounded like a song. Louis liked it, even though he didn't really understand it. It felt like this. "Yeah?"

"Yeah," Louis said, and he pressed send. 

"You ready to go to bed yet?" Liam asked, once it said _upload complete_ and Louis's world had changed forever, in ways he couldn't even begin to think about. 

Louis slid his hand into Liam's. "Think so."

Liam smiled at him. "Come on," he said. "Come to bed."

"Alright, Mr Tomlinson."

"Yep," Liam said. "That's me."

Louis squeezed his hand, and led him inside. 

**Epilogue**

Liam came back from the bar with two full trays of shots. He was flanked on one side by his burly security guard, Paddy, and on the other by Niall, who was carrying two bottles of champagne and being followed by Zayn with one tray of glasses, and Harry with a second tray. 

Louis—who was mostly staying vertical through happiness alone, since he was beautifully, desperately, wonderfully inebriated—cheered. 

"You're drunk already," Liam said, sinking down into the booth next to him and wrapping an arm around Louis's shoulders. 

Louis kissed his neck. He even tasted lovely. Louis had the best husband. "It is my graduation day," Louis said. "I am a fully qualified teacher with a postgraduate degree. I am absolutely worthy of you."

Liam made a face. "You were always worthy of me," he said. "And you've been a teacher for almost a whole term already. Today doesn't change anything. Except we get to celebrate."

Louis tried not to look too fondly at him. "Stop being a knobhead," he said, as nicely as he could when the room was starting to spin. "Now we can correct all those journalists who say I'm your sponging student husband."

"Louis," Liam said. "Ignore them."

"I know, I know." Louis absolutely ignored the dickhead journalists who accused him—subtly or not—of rekindling his romance with Liam purely for financial gain. One magazine had even broken down the income of Liam's arena tour and then halved it to show Louis's increased income for the year; Louis had very savagely shoved that particular article into the barbecue they'd had to say goodbye to their terrible student house in the summer. In response, Liam had given a startlingly open interview to _Attitude_ magazine about how brave Louis had been. Zayn and Niall had blown those paragraphs up and given them to Louis as a framed graduation gift the day before. 

Everyone Louis knew was terrible. 

"Have a shot," Liam said, nudging something red and disgraceful across the table towards him, and taking another for himself. "Do you want to see all the videos I took of you today?"

Louis had already seen Liam's pictures. He'd seen them once outside the graduation hall, and again in the car on the way to the restaurant for dinner with Louis's family, and then again when Liam had showed them to all of Louis's sisters and his brother and his mum. He'd even seen them on Liam's Twitter, when Liam had gone all proud husband on him and posted the picture of him and his graduation certificate directly to Instagram. "Do I have to?" he asked, pulling a face and downing his shot. 

"Yes," Liam said. He was already reaching for his bag. "Like you didn't tell everyone when I got to number one."

"That was a number one album, Liam. Not the same." It would have been the same if Louis could have helped it, but his Twitter and his Instagram and his Facebook were all locked down. He was a teacher now, and there was absolutely no way at all he could continue doing that if every picture of him drunk and all over his husband could be plucked directly from his social media accounts by the kids he was teaching. 

Louis nuzzled Liam's neck again. 

"Why'd you smell so nice?"

"Dunno," Liam said. "Are you going to let me show you these videos, or what?"

Louis tucked himself in against Liam's side. "You're terrible," he said. "You're the worst. Load them up, then. Come on."

Liam grinned and kissed Louis's forehead. "Love you," he said. "Mr Payne."

"You two are revolting," Niall said, leaning over and poking them both in the shoulder. 

"We're in love," Louis said, sticking his tongue out. 

"We know," Zayn said. He sounded vaguely long-suffering. "Everyone knows. Literally everyone knows."

"Apart from my nan," Louis said. She still thought Liam and Louis were just best friends who had just bought a house together because it was cheaper to get a mortgage that way. She'd even come to their housewarming in half term and had a long conversation with Liam about how criminal it was that two young men like the two of them couldn't afford to buy a house by themselves. She'd had the entire conversation under a montage of pictures Liam had put together of their wedding day, but she was so far from comprehending the idea of two men getting married that the entire thing had completely passed her by. 

"Your nan's special," Liam said. "Look at this one, this was just when you were walking down to line up by the stage."

"I was there," Louis said. "I do remember."

"There's been a lot of wine since then," Niall pointed out. He raised his pint glass. "And beer."

Zayn handed round the shots again. "Drink up," he said. "Get this down you."

Louis obliged, and leaned up to lick his way into Liam's mouth. 

Liam kissed him back for a minute, then pulled away. "The next one's of you by the side of the stage."

Louis rolled his eyes. "Fine," he said. "Go on. Show me them all."

"Good-oh," Liam said. It hadn't always been easy, figuring a way through. Their families had been surprised and confused, and the media hadn't been as blasé about Liam coming out as they had about Sam Smith. Liam—marketed towards a mainstream pop audience—might have hit number one, but his album hadn't stayed there for more than a week. 

It hurt, seeing that. It hurt, knowing that Louis was responsible for his dip in popularity, but Liam just said it was all right. His _Attitude_ cover had sold more copies than any other _Attitude_ in the last eight months—pipped to the post by Tom Daley's cover nine months ago—but he'd been torso of the week in _Heat_ three weeks ago. Louis had laminated his torso of the week shot on the English department's laminator and brought it home to stick on the fridge. 

"Hey," Liam said, once Louis had sat through five more videos of his own graduation, and he'd had two more shots, "you know I'm going to be singing at the BBC Music Awards next month?"

"Nope," Louis said, a little drunkenly. He licked at Liam's jaw. The VIP area was great. No one was pointing their phones in their general direction, and nobody was pushing their way over to get an autograph. It was just Liam and Louis and their friends, and the best fucking day of his life, and he was so fucking happy he didn't know what to do with himself. 

"They asked me to sing," Liam said, a little hopefully. "And it means I get to bring a date."

Louis tucked his hand into Liam's. "Yes?"

"Well," Liam said. "I need someone to be my date. You know, walk down the red carpet with me. Cheer me on. That sort of thing."

"That sort of thing," Louis repeated. He was back in school on Monday, with a timetable full of kids who thought drama was a doss subject and who were more interested in who was going out with who than in what Louis was trying to teach them. This term had been a steep learning curve, and it hadn't helped that Liam had been away on tour for so much of it, leaving him alone in their house with only himself for company. The kids had found out who he was married to four weeks into term, and that had gone as well as expected. He snuggled into Liam's side. 

"Well," Liam said. "Will you? Come with me?"

"Oh, Liam," Louis said, burying his nose in Liam's side. "You idiot."

Liam grinned at him. "That's a yes, right?"

"Only if you'll let me take nine million videos of you on my phone, and I can show you them all ten times a day for the next forever."

"Deal," Liam said, laughing. "Deal."

When Liam kissed him, everyone at their table cheered, but Louis just stuck his middle finger up at them all, and kissed Liam back.

[end]

**Author's Note:**

> [tumblr](http://magicalrocketships.tumblr.com/) // [twitter](https://twitter.com/sunsetmog)


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